Tornado Warnings and Power Outages in Rochester

On Thursday, August 19th the Tornado Warnings and Tornado Watches were sent out by the National Weather Service and Nixle in the Rochester area.  The picture attached was taken by Journalist Dan Stickradt of North Oakland Sports while attending a four-way football scrimmage at Oakland University in Rochester Hills. Stickradt reported, “The cloud movement was amazing. You could see the clouds going up and down and also in a circular, rotation pattern. On three different occasions, a small cone popped out of the clouds, but each time lasted maybe 10 seconds.”  I am not sure if the tornado ever touched down in our city, but I know there were over 80,000 people without power in the tri-county area. The winds were 70 mph in many areas and there were power lines down through Oakland County. The Detroit News reported that it spoke to DTE Energy Co. spokesman Scott Simons who said about 80,000 of the homes and businesses it serves lost power. Power outages were clustered in the northern suburbs, Simons said. CMS Energy Corp. said about 1,700 of its customers lost power. It was too early to tell how long restoration will take, but “we’ll be working through tonight and into tomorrow,” Simons said.