High winds cause damage in mid-Missouri

The Centralia Police Department reported snapped power lines and damage to certain areas on Wednesday morning after high winds moved through the area.

According to the National Weather Service, Centralia saw some wind gusts of 45 mph.

Very high winds have been observed overnight last night into early this morning. Highest gusts have been over 60 mph! #stlwx #mowx #ilwx #midmowx 🍃🍂 pic.twitter.com/8ITS9RFyn6

— NWS St. Louis (@NWSStLouis) November 27, 2019

The city began working to repair power lines at 10 p.m. Tuesday night, according to a city spokeswoman. Most of the damage was located in the areas between Howard Burton Drive and Jefferson Street and then from Head Street to Early Street, the spokeswoman said.

More than 20 homes and the Centralia Public Library were without power. Electricity was restored to most of the buildings around 12 Wednesday afternoon. Crews were still out working on smaller outages at 5 p.m.

The Mayor of Centralia Chris Cox was on the scene Wednesday taking a look at the damage.

"The poles really took a beating last night and these weren't really bad poles, these were pretty sturdy poles," Cox said. "So we had some pretty good winds, it takes a lot to break that off."

While Cox said no one was hurt in the winds, around midnight, some of the crew members were almost hit by part of the broken pole while they were working to fix it.

"There's high risk and high danger in what they do in an everyday situation, let alone if there is weather involved," Cox said. "You have to be very cautious to protect yourself and to protect the city and get the city back in shape."

Authorities in Mexico, Missouri, also responded to numerous incidents of items in the roadway and a small fire as high winds moved through the area Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.

Tree limbs, trash cans and other household items were blown into the roadway overnight, according to the Mexico Public Safety Department.

The globe of a street light and a street sign also became detached and were located in the roadway around the city square the release said.

Authorities also responded to a fire at a property in the 1200 block of north Clark Street. The caretaker of the property was burning leaves and yard waste and thought the fire was extinguished, the release said. The winds made the fire rekindle and blow across the property, but authorities were able to extinguish the fire without any property damage or injuries, the release said.

A couple of power lines were also damaged, causing a short outage in the south part of Mexico.

According to the National Weather Service, Mexico saw wind gusts up to 51 mph.

There were no reports of personal property damage or injuries, the release said.