ELMDALE — The air Saturday morning at Elmdale was filled with the smell of sawdust and the sound of chain saws as residents picked up after a storm that hit during the late night hours of Friday and the early morning hours of Saturday.
The storm left residents without power and water Saturday. Crews were working tirelessly Saturday to repair downed power lines and replace snapped power poles.
Chase County resident Tosha Dains was helping clean up after the storm. In the yard she was standing in a trampoline stood upside down. It had been moved from atop a van where it landed after being blown across the yard. Dains, who lives outside of town, said she saw damage all over Elmdale when she came to town.
“(Downed) trees was all you could see,” Dains said. “And power lines.”
Dains said the storm hit her home outside of town and they received lots of wind and rain along with some pea-sized hail.
Elmdale resident Roger Carpenter was surveying the damage to his property Saturday morning.
“My garage is gone,” he said, pointing to a garage that had trees on and around it. “My van is gone.”
Trees were snapped and twisted in Carpenter’s yard and large limbs littered the yard.
“It’s going to be a mess to clean up,” he said.
Carpenter said he was out near Salina when the storm hit and when he returned, he couldn’t get into his driveway. However, he counts himself lucky.
“I’m luckier than most,” he said. “I still have my house standing.”
Harold K. Wells, owner of Elmdale Trading Post, wasn’t so lucky. The building his business is housed in sustained heavy damage as did his home.
“It’s a mess,” Wells said, of the store. “It’s damaged.”
“Damaged” could be seen as an understatement as parts of the roof of the building were ripped off and twisted upward. A beam went through the roof and stands half out and half in, with sunlight can be seen spilling in through the roof in several places. Shattered light fixtures littered the floor and water puddled inside part of the building.
Wells also said he received damage to his home, five miles outside of Elmdale.
“It took off most of the roof,” he said. “It took the shingles off.”