This was a common site in Calera Monday morning as residents cleared the wreckage.
This large tree was uprooted during the winds.
Trees were damaged or destroyed throughout Calera.
CALERA - For the third time in as many weeks, a “microburst” thunderstorm has targeted this Bryan County community.
On Sunday, winds estimated as high as 85 m.p.h. collapsed a home on Pate Road, sending six people to three hospitals in two states. One woman remaiend in intensive care at a Dallas hospital, according to Joel “Butch” Scalf, Calera’s director of emergency operations.
He identified the woman as a Calera school employee, and said she was transported to a Dallas hospital with a brain injury. Four other people were taken to Texoma Medical Center and another was taken to Medical Center of Southeast Oklahoma.
According to Calera Fire-Rescue, four people had minor injuries. Roads have been blocked due to the debris and more than 20 powerlines were knocked down. Some power has been restored to the south side of town.
“Power has not been fully restored,” Scalf said on Tuesday. “There are still about 150 homes without power.”
Scalf said OG&E would be doubling their crews and expected full power to be restored by Tuesday. Crews could be seen Monday restoring a major transmission line which was knocked over on the south side of Calera.
School remained closed for a second day Tuesday. Scalf commended a group of Calera high school students for volunteering on Monday to pick up debris around the town.
Winds knocked down power lines, tree limbs, signs and also damaged structures in Calera, and Durant/Bryan County Emergency Management set up a command center in the town. Power outages occurred in some areas, including the nursing home at Colbert that was operating on a battery back-up until OG&E arrived to restore power.
Scalf said an estimated 300 homes sustained some form of damage due to this latest storm. Residents were still in the process from picking up after a late July thunderstorm knocked down several trees in the area. Possible damage was alos reported along Highway 78 near Achille.
Calera residents are being asked to conserve water because the city is using the water tower. Scalf said the pumps and treatment plant were never impacted by the outages.
Hail also fell in some areas, and northwestern Durant received rain and light winds. This is the third time within the last several weeks that Calera has seen damaging high winds come through the town.
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