By Staff
TREE DAMAGE – Verna Thrash and her daughter, Jessica, survey damage at their 32nd Street home Thursday after an oak tree fell on it. Verna said Jessica was in her bedroom when the tree fell and cracked the ceiling. The Thrashes have been remodeling the house for six months and were going to have the tree cut down this weekend. Photo by Carisa McCain/The Meridian Star
By Steve Gillespie / staff writer and William F. West / community editor
Sept. 27, 2002
This week's steady rains took their toll on big trees, toppling an oak onto a home at 2214 32nd St. Thursday afternoon.
Verna Thrash said her husband, Kevin, was asleep and their daughter, Jessica, was changing her clothes in her bedroom when the tree fell about 1:30 p.m.
Verna Thrash, a nurse at Rush Foundation Hospital, said things could have been worse.
She said her husband, an engineering analyst with Mississippi Power, was home after working all night in the company's Newton County office. He was resting up because company officials said he might be needed again Thursday night.
The couple's daughter, who had been kept out of school because of the weather, was at home changing clothes so she could go to a hair appointment.
Shook 'em up'
As she talked on the phone late Thursday afternoon, the sound of a chain saw could be heard in the background.
Ironically, she and her husband had planned to remove the tree this weekend.
Meanwhile, just around the block on 23rd Avenue, another towering tree had fallen across the road.
Things started getting back to "normal" in the Meridian area Thursday afternoon as what was left of tropical storm Isidore moved north, leaving downed trees, power outages and water.
In less than 36 hours, Meridian received more than double its average rainfall for September.
Nearly 7.5 inches
By 1 p.m. Thursday, John Baxter, warning coordination officer in Meridian with the National Weather Service, said 7.47 inches of rain had fallen since 8 p.m. Tuesday. The average rainfall for the area in September is 3.52 inches.
Along with soil erosion and street flooding, Baxter said the long rain may make for muddy fields and slow down harvests for farmers.
Thousands lose power
About 1,300 Meridian residents lost power for varying lengths of time between midnight and 2 p.m. Thursday, said Pat Wylie, a Mississippi Power spokesman.
In Mississippi Power's 23-county service area in Southeast Mississippi, about 20,000 customers lost power during the same period.