Severe storms and at least four tornadoes ravaged New York state overnight, leaving a trail of destruction that left at least one person dead and hundreds of thousands of power lines lost due to downed power lines.
NBC affiliate WPTZ Plattsburgh, New York, Radar images were used Two in Hamilton County and one east in Warren County to confirm tornado touchdowns in Rome, 17 miles northwest of Utica.
Authorities confirmed one death in the village of Canastota, Madison County, west of Rome.
More than 110,000 people were without power across New York Wednesday morning, as were 103,000 and more than 100,000 in Illinois.
Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Emergency Statewide on Tuesday. Central New York, the Mohawk Valley and the Southern Tier have been hit hard, he said. He was joined by Rome Mayor Jeffrey Lanigan and Oneida County Executive Anthony J. Picente Jr. spoke with both.
Lanigan told a news conference: “It looks like a war zone.”
There are also storms and heavy rains Forecast for Wednesday and a local Emergency until 8 a.m. Wednesday in Canastota and Lenox. A street in Canasthota is under a mandatory evacuation order.
Pictures from Rome show roads completely blocked by fallen trees, sidewalks destroyed by uprooted trees, and downed streetlights and power poles. A team from the National Weather Service office in Binghamton Inspection of the area on Wednesday.
Winds gusting nearly 80 mph in Rome were strong enough to overturn vehicles, shatter windows, destroy the roof and steeple of a church and send a large B-52 bomber several feet off its ramp to the entrance of Griffith Air Force Base.
The severe weather in the inner Northeast comes 24 hours after the Midwest was also hit by storms and several tornadoes. The National Weather Service issued 16 tornado warnings, the most in a single day since 2004.
A woman was confirmed dead in Indiana on Tuesday as a result of the storm. Laura Nagel, 44, was killed when a tree fell on a house during a storm in Cedar Lake, Indiana. The Lake County Coroner’s Office said.
A community of 3,000 in Nashville, Illinois, was inundated Tuesday. The dam broke, placing 300 homes under eviction orders. The National Weather Service reported 5 to 7 inches of rain in eight hours.
The severe weather also affected Canada’s largest city, Toronto, and music star Drake He posted the video on Instagram His house there shows flooding. “It better be an espresso martini,” he said of the dark brown water.
