Severe Weather in Metro Detroit: Tornadoes Cause Extensive Damage

Almost two days have passed since severe weather impacted multiple communities in Metro Detroit. The National Weather Service confirmed that three tornadoes touched down in Southeast Michigan during the storm.

We were driving down, and we see these uprooted trees and we couldn’t believe it, said Julie Vasquez, who grew up in Lincoln Park, Michigan. An EF-0 tornado swept through Lincoln Park on Thursday. The winds peaked at 70 mph around 4 p.m., damaging Fort Street and the vicinity of Kennedy Memorial Rec and Senior Center. Surprisingly, the nearby First Baptist Church remained unscathed.

Vasquez expressed her sorrow, saying, She was just here at a concert a couple weeks ago and I grew up here. It’s devastating.

In another incident on Meldrum and Benson streets in Detroit, an EF-2 tornado caused significant damage, tearing apart homes and industrial buildings while taking down many power lines. However, New Liberty Baptist Church only experienced a power outage.

We were very amazed by the damage around us, but very little to our church building, said Pastor Maurice Stimage. As the church’s pastor for 20 years, he remarked on the community’s unprecedented devastation but vowed assistance from his church members.

Pastor Stimage further reflected, It’s just devastating. It just feels like we’ve been hit really hard. There are many small businesses in this area wondering how they’re going to come back from this type of devastation.

DTE Energy’s Senior Vice President of Electric Operations, Brian Claka, noted, Damage that I am seeing here is one of the, if not the most, significant damage due to a weather event in my career. He reported around 4,000 utility workers were engaged in restoring power as of Saturday afternoon. From the onset of the storm on Wednesday, approximately 450,000 customers experienced outages, with 75,961 still without service by 5:45 p.m. Saturday.

DTE is focused on restoring power and reinforcing its infrastructure for future resilience. The company cautions those involved in cleanup or using generators to exercise safety.

The utility advises against starting cleanup before crews assess power line hazards. Claka emphasized the importance of generator safety, stating, We do realize the generators are in use. I can hear a few going on right now. Please, please do not put them indoors. They should remain outdoors.

DTE aims to restore power to 90% to 92% of its customers by Saturday night.