DaytonDailyNews.com

DAYTON — One in five DP&L customers are without power Sunday, Sept. 14, after high winds wreaked havoc, downing trees and power lines.

But the worst is over.

As the area-wide wind advisory ended at 9 p.m., the National Weather Service office in Wilmington called for "a slight chance of showers" through the evening, with "breezy" conditions through the night.

The power could be off for more than a day at some residences, officials said.

DP&L officials urged people to treat all downed wires as live and said restoring power to all customers would be a "multi-day effort," spokesman Tom Tatham said. The utility has 500,000 customers across the region. About 100,000 are without power. In Warren County, more than 55,000 Duke Energy customers were out of power as of 7:30 p.m.

At Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Col. Bradley Spacy, commander of the 88th Air Base Wing, was out surveying the damage, said Estella Holmes, public affairs specialist for the base. Power was out at the base but Holmes could not specify where the outages are.

"There's mostly wind damage with limbs down and downed power lines," she said.

Holmes added that security forces were called in from their normal weekend day off to also help assess damage.

Exercising caution

On Sunday afternoon, The National Weather Service was urging motorists to avoid travel after winds gusting more than 55 mph ripped through trees, buildings and power lines. Several events, including X-Fest and the Concours d' Elegance, were shut down early.

A wind gust of 69 mph was recorded at the Dayton International Airport Sunday, said Weather Service meteorologist Myron Padgett. The highest gust in the region was 78 mph at Lebanon, he said.

Other reported wind gusts were 68 mph in Wilmington, 74 mph in Cincinnati and 75 mph in Columbus.

The Miami County Communications Center issued a countywide message requesting all county residents to remain inside, and asked residents to refrain from calling 911 to report downed wires and tree limbs.

Springboro police also requested residents to stay in their homes. Warren County's 911 system was down from about 3:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Sunday.

Warren County Department of Emergency Services director Frank Young, who was working from the Emergency Operations Center in the basement of the courthouse in Lebanon, said he was aware of one injury in the county. A person was struck by a tree or a tree branch in Springboro and was transported to the hospital.

"We've had a phenomenal amount of calls for structural damage and trees down. There are thousands of trees down in the county. It looks like a bomb went off down here," he said.

He said a lot of structural damage included reports of shingle damage and windows blown out.

"We're asking people to stay in their houses. If this power comes back on, we don't want people being fried. Stay put tonight."

Commerce across the Miami Valley died away as the winds picked up Sunday.

Through the south suburbs, cars and trucks moved cautiously through intersections, the occasional blaring horn reminding drivers that a dark stoplight should be treated as a four-way stop.

At a Walgreens in Kettering, customers attracted by a hand-drawn "We're open" poster searched for batteries and flashlights. Several paused at the checkout line as they realized that no power meant no credit cards or ATMs. A few blocks away, a Speedway gas station still had power and customers lines up onto Stroop Road for a chance to fill up.

In Centerville, power was out except for an island of light at the Cross Pointe Shopping center, with restaurants doing a brisk business. LaRosa's alone had 100 customers at one point. At a Papa John's Pizza near 725 and Wilington Pike, employees sat idly on the curb in the fading afternoon light.

A power outage also knocked WHIO-TV (Channel 7) off the air mid-afternoon, but the signal was back up just before 5 p.m.

At 2:49 p.m., the Montgomery County fairgrounds were deemed unsafe due to a damaged tree, prompting officials to order an evacuation of X-Fest.

After the evacuation, people huddled under buildings waiting for shuttle buses to pick them up. Some were stranded waiting for people to pick them up.

Scaffolding collapsed and spilled into Third Street in front of City Hall.

Wind ripped off part of the roof on a building at Main and Franklin streets in downtown Dayton, next to the Community Blood Center. It landed on the RTA's high voltage wires.

"And it's still coming off," said Officer J. Seiter, who sat in his cruiser that helped block motorists from traveling on Main Street between Washington and Sixth streets Sunday evening, where bricks spilled onto the sidewalk below.

In Vandalia, extra crews were brought in to clear debris, but then they were diverted by a water main break. They removed a tree from a home.

In Riverside, crews removed debris, but stopped at dark for workers' safety.

Several flights were diverted to Dayton International Airport due to high winds, and some flights were cancelled Sunday. It wasn't immediately clear if the cancellations were a result of weather in Dayton or elsewhere, airport spokeswoman Linda Hughes said. The airport remains open and airplanes continue to land, she said.

In Dayton, police directed traffic as lights were out and traffic moved slowly. The gusts downed green awnings at Third and Main streets. Cody Roberts, 18, of Dayton suffered a minor scratch on his torso.

"It scared me a bit," said Roberts, who was trying to catch a bus to North Dixie Drive and Little York Road.

Woodland Cemetery had trees down. Fencing was blown down near the CareSource building in Dayton and Dayton Power & Light trucks were driving around.

Power and traffic signals were reported out in Oakwood, Centerville, Kettering, Dayton, Beavercreek, Fairborn, Washington Twp., Troy, Xenia and other areas. Gusts knocked about construction barrels, impeding motorists.

The high winds also prompted the Dayton Concours d'Elegance at Carillon Park to end more than an hour early.

Two large tree limbs had fallen during the event, causing one minor injury, said Skip Peterson, chairman of the all-volunteer event committee that organizes the event showcasing antique and classic cars.

Robert Tegtmeyer, who had his 1957 black Corvette on display, hopped behind the wheel about 2:30 p.m. to move it out from underneath a large tree.

"He's had a couple of limbs hit it already," his daughter, Linda Tegtmeyer of Dayton, said. "It scratched it a little bit but he said he can buff it out. That's his baby."

An Oakwood Police officer on the police scanner told other emergency personnel to stop reporting what roads were blocked because "all of them" were blocked.

Part of the roof on a building at Main and Franklin streets in downtown Dayton, next to the Community Blood Center, ripped off and landed on the RTA's high voltage wires.

"And it's still coming off," said Officer J. Seiter, who sat in his cruiser that helped block motorists from traveling on Main Street between Washington and Sixth streets Sunday evening, where bricks spilled onto the sidewalk below.

Medics took the injured man, who was alert and conscious, to a local hospital. The branch struck him on a shoulder as it fell and he reported feeling sore, Peterson said.

"We really felt because of the crowd of poeple there and all the trees around, we wanted to conclude the show and get people out of the park for their own safety," Peterson said.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7457 or bsutherly@DaytonDailyNews.com.