SYKESVILLE, Md. — Manning chainsaws to cut away large swaths of downed trees, workers cleared the lanes of Route 97, but the clean up will take more time on nearby Monument Drive in Sykesville.
Michelle Byrnes awoke during the storm about four o’clock in the morning.
“There was huge hail that I’ve never heard that bad before and the wind was just whipping around all sides of the house,” said Byrnes. “I mean it was crazy. It wasn’t directional. It was just everywhere, and it was louder than anything I’ve ever heard here before.”
Surveying the storm’s path over a mile span to Klee Mill Road, we found some trees downed and others splintered, much like the damage Byrnes awakened to hours after the storm had passed.
“I woke up and of course the first thing I saw was a big tree in my front lawn and then another tree and more debris,” recalled Byrnes. “and then I looked across and I saw my neighbor’s trees and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh. It was much worse than I thought.”
Crews also worked to clear trees and downed power lines from an earlier cell, which struck along Old Court Road in Woodstock across the Baltimore County line.
“It must have been very brief,” said Patrik Bavoil. “I heard some rumbling and then the dogs started… rumbling thunder basically. It was not that close either. The thunder was not that close. We had a very local burst of wind here. I don’t know why.”
But that damage paled in comparison to what would come later in Sykesville leaving many people convinced they had survived a tornado.
