Contractors and homeowners are being told to prepare for damaging winds. The warnings come after two destructive storms left property owners with roof, home and fence damage that they’re scrambling to repair. NBC 5’s Alicia Barrera has the story.
The series of warnings and alerts has a lot of North Texas first responders and business operators gearing up just after experiencing two severe storms that left damage across several communities.
Mark Richie with HomeWorks LLC said his phone has not stopped ringing since Saturday morning when the latest rounds of storms blew through Ellis County.
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WATCH HERE“We've called in some of our reinforcements to help as many homeowners as we could because of the damage that was in the Ellis County, Waxahachie, Palmer,” Richie said. “We've seen anything from turbines that were completely blown off, power bank covers that were completely open.”
On Thursday, he was inspecting roofs in Red Oak affected by Saturday’s hail.
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SIGN UP “We learned a lot again from Saturday, so we've got crews on standby,” Richie said. “We normally keep four to five, you know, maybe six people on staff to do our roof repairs and installations. We have the availability to get as many as 40, 50 people as we need.”
In Ennis, piles of tree limbs can be seen in front of many homes.
“The other day, we were doing four jobs a day. We've been very, very busy this week,” Joel Rodriguez said. Rodriguez has been working with Axperts Tree Service for ten years.
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“It's trees falling in over on the houses, falling in on electrical lines. But mostly the electric company comes out and works on those,” Rodriguez said.
He said Thursday’s focus was on preventative measures.
“We’re taking care of a tree that fell over into the neighbor's yard. And we're actually going to do some preventative maintenance too. We're cutting down some other trees, so it doesn’t happen again,” Rodriguez said.
In a statement, ONCOR said the protocol for Friday for high winds will be similar to when they prepare and respond to any other storm.
“Oncor is closely monitoring a storm system expected to bring widespread, high winds with the potential of 60-65 mph gusts to portions of our service area throughout the day Friday. Employees and resources will be standing by and ready to respond to any resulting outage impacts as soon as safely possible,” a spokesperson for ONCOR said.
Flights are also a big concern as spring break travel is underway. Both DFW International and Love Field Airports said their operations remain normal but will monitor conditions and adjust as needed.
Ground stops would be issued by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
“Our message to travelers is to check their flight schedules or with the airlines before arriving at the airport. We also advise staying informed about weather and road conditions and follow us on our social media platforms for any updates regarding the airport,” a spokesperson for Dallas Love Field said.
