Punishing heat, storms finally give region a break
Milder weather lets crews work to restore power
7/9/2012
A utility line lies under a tree in the 1800 block of South Holland-Sylvania Road, one of many areas damaged in Thursday's storm. About 870 Toledo Edison customers were without power Sunday night.
The Blade/Jetta Fraser
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A utility line lies under a tree in the 1800 block of South Holland-Sylvania Road, one of many areas damaged in Thursday's storm. About 870 Toledo Edison customers were without power Sunday night.
Ahh, relief.
After 10 days of high heat -- often accompanied by sultry humidity and occasionally punctuated by violent thunderstorms -- Toledo settled back to normal summer Sunday, with a high temperature matching the National Weather Service's 30-year average for the date.
The milder weather, featuring an afternoon high of 85 degrees at Toledo Express Airport, gave those on whom Thursday afternoon's severe weather dumped extra yard work more pleasant conditions than on Friday or Saturday.
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The official Toledo highs reached 99 Friday and 100 Saturday, and other nearby communities soared even further into triple digits.
Doug Colafella, a spokesman for Toledo Edison, said Sunday's cooler weather was a boon to line crews still working to repair damage from the thunderstorm Thursday that hit western Toledo and neighboring suburbs especially hard and was blamed for one fatality.
Selby Thames of East Toledo plants collard greens in his garden after a break in the excessive heat and occasional thunderstorms in the area the last 10 days. The outlook for this week is much more pleasant, with highs in the mid-80s.
"Clearly for our folks out in the field, these are much better working conditions," Mr. Colafella said. The weather Friday and Saturday was "really dangerous" for people working outdoors for extended hours, he said.
As of 7 p.m., just more than 500 Edison customers in Toledo were still without power, along with 370 in Sylvania Township and "a handful" in Springfield Township, the spokesman said.
"We are getting close" to having all storm-related damage repaired, with Edison still aiming at a late-Sunday goal, Mr. Colafella said.
Most of the remaining outages involved individual customers whose home or business service lines were damaged by the storm, he said.
Thursday's storm was blamed for the death of Joseph Zimmerman, 35, of Springfield Township. He was inside his newly purchased vehicle trying to close its windows against the rain when a tree fell on the vehicle.
Memorial arrangements for Mr. Zimmerman were announced Sunday. His family is to receive visitors Thursday from 2 to 8 p.m. in the Newcomer Funeral Home, 4752 Heatherdowns Blvd. Funeral services are to be Friday at 11 a.m. in the mortuary.
Along with several daily record highs, the heat wave set a durability record on Saturday. That day was Toledo's 10th consecutive with a temperature of at least 90 degrees, besting a nine-day streak that occurred last year.
Lower nighttime temperatures also were in this week's forecast, with the dryer air that moved into the lower Great Lakes early Sunday expected to allow the mercury to fall to about 60 by sunrise today. Morning lows since Tuesday had been no lower than 68, including a muggy 75 on Saturday morning.
Mid-80s highs and pleasant, low-60s lows were forecast to persist until Friday, when a moderate warm-up was predicted by the National Weather Service. No rain was in the seven-day outlook.
One possible heat-wave legacy that persists today is the continued closing of Adams Street between Superior and St. Clair streets because of a water-main break on Friday.
Although the broken 12-inch main beneath St. Clair was repaired, a large hole blocking half the street was only partially back-filled with gravel afterward. Jen Sorgenfrei, a Bell administration spokesman, said officials from the city Division of Streets, Bridges, and Harbor are to visit the site today to assess repair needs for the street and sidewalks there.
Ms. Sorgenfrei said the St. Clair break was one of "eight to 10" water-main failures on Friday and that the heat was likely to have been a factor, because of high demand for water and the effects of residents illegally opening fire hydrants to cool off on city streets.
Contact David Patch at: dpatch@theblade.com or 419-724-6094.