Cleanup Continues After Recent Storms

Approximately 11,000 ComEd customers in Crystal Lake lost power after a wind shear blasted through the city on July 11, uprooting trees and downing power lines, police said. 

Five days later power had been restored to all customers, while cleanup from the storm’s devastating effects continues weeks later. The city continues to be pummeled with unusually causing and power outages. 

According to the National Weather Service, a derecho — a powerful windstorm moving in one direction — swept across not only the Central Plains and Midwest but persisted to the Eastern coastline.

Crystal Lake police updated the community with daily releases informing the public of the number of ComEd consumers without power, the location of cooling centers, storm debris and refuse collection schedules and tips on food safety. 

Police, Crystal Lake Fire/Rescue and City Hall were among the thousands of ComEd consumers that lost power during the storm, said Patrol Cmdr. Dan Dziewior. Generators powered radio systems and the dispatch center and allowed for basic operations in the department’s building. Power was restored to the municipal building on July 12.   

That included the emergency command center situated in the basement of the building in conjunction with the dispatch center, he said, where the extensive emergency training police and fire/rescue continually practice came into play. 

The teams were joined by the Public Works Department and a representative from ComEd. 

Dziewior said he couldn’t recall a storm of such severity hitting the city in the 24 years he has been with the police department. 

“I can’t remember a time when we had that many folks without power for that long of a period of time,” he said. 

Dziewior reported no injuries or serious situations resulting from the storm. While emergency services are prepared as much as possible for Mother Nature’s storms, there really is no way to know what to expect. 

Deputy Fire/Rescue Chief Paul DeRaedt said in the first 24 hours of the storm, the department received 147 calls for service compared to the 12 it typically receives in a day.

Most of the calls were about power lines down or arcing, he said.  Those areas would be cordoned off and residents warned to stay away; downed wires on the ground required the help of Public Works to get barricades up until ComEd could get to the scene. 

The calls temporarily ebbed about 2 p.m. July 11, increasing again when people returned to their homes after work noticing arcing or downed power lines. By the end of the day July 12, call volume began to return to normal.

DeRaedt recommends people visit the department’s website for information on emergency preparedness and prepare emergency kits with bottled water, bandages, spare batteries, a radio and anything else needed for multiple days. 

“It’s not that often we get multiple-day outages in this area, but in a situation like this we need to be prepared and stock up for things to last three to five days,” he said. 

Public Works Director Victor Ramirez said that by the end of the day July 11, all streets had been reopened except for two or three that had wires or trees blocking them that were barricaded off — a testament to working together with police and fire to respond to calls and clear roadways. 

About 40 personnel from Public Works, Building and Engineering were on the scene the first day of the storm, clearing streets with end loaders and trucks — even putting a plow on the back of one truck to push the debris off the streets, he said. 

The biggest challenge was finding and removing severely damaged trees and tree limbs that might fall on power lines, as they were not always easy to spot. 

“Now the leaves are turning brown and they’re easier to see,” he said. 

Trees and debris were taken to the city’s cold storage facility, where it quickly began to fill up the large asphalt lot. The volume is too much for the city to manage mulching on its own, so it is assessing costs for hiring or renting a tub grinder to do that or contracting the work out. 

Despite continual pickup of debris by Public Works, there was still much more rubble to collect that residents had put on the parkways as of July 20 for pickup. 

Fortunately, water supplies were not affected due to the large supply of water stored in the wells’ towers. Two of the five city wells have generators. 

“We were able to meet demand by tweaking the operations of the wells,” Ramirez said. 

More problematic were the 19 sewer lift stations left without power — about three-fourths of the city’s lift stations. 

Three crews worked through the night July 11 to rotate generators from station to station until some power was restored on July 12. 

Clean up continues, Ramirez said, with 24 people and two contractors still collecting debris as late as June 20. 

Ramirez asks people call the Public Works Department at 815-356-3614 to report hanging power lines, trees or hanging tree limbs.