High wind rips across Clarendon

A late afternoon storm Monday did considerable damage to trees and property in Clarendon.

What started as a sprinkle quickly turned into a driving rain that filled street gutters and dropped visibility to almost zero on city streets.

As the wind picked up, a sudden strong east wind hit briefly and left its mark in several places.

At the historic McMurtry house at Sixth and Allen, where the Todd Knorpp family lives, the remains of a huge elm tree was knocked over, crushing a wrought iron fence and doing considerable damage but apparently missing the home itself. The tree itself had already died during the long drought of the last few years

On the opposite side of the block, at the old Stina Cain house at Sixth and Sims, large limbs of an evergreen tree were torn off; and other nearby properties also lost tree limbs of various sizes.

Further west, on College Hill, a large pine tree of 40+ years was toppled south of Clarendon College’s Knorpp Hall. The greatest damage was probably sustained on the college softball field where the Lady Bulldogs’ scoreboard was ripped from its I-beam posts. The electronic bottom two-thirds of the sign was left a ruined mess in the outfield. The top third of the sign was deposited and crumpled some 50 yards to the west against a barbed wire fence across the parking lot from Regents Hall.

The shoulders of Third Street between the First Baptist Church and Broncho Stadium again sustained erosion during the deluge, and crews also responded there to a power line that was ripped down.