(La Porte County, IN) - La Porte County and southwest Michigan seemed to take the brunt of a Tuesday night storm that some residents compared to a tropical storm and even a low level hurricane.

 

NIPSCO reported about two-thirds of the over 3,000 customers still without power Wednesday morning in its northern Indiana customer service territory were in the Michigan City and La Porte areas.

 

Bob Johnson, who lives near Michigan City High School, said heavy rain blown by very strong winds came down “sideways” and lightning filled the skies.

“The sky was lit up. It was a pretty colorful show,” he said.

 

The storm lasting for about 30 minutes appeared to live up to National Weather Service forecasts of wind gusts of up to 70 miles per hour.

 

“I would say at least that, if not, more,” he said.

 

Street department crews in Michigan City and La Porte were out after the storm and throughout the following day removing fallen trees and limbs along with other related debris from streets.

 

La Porte Street Department Superintendent Mike Frase expects the clean-up to continue into Thursday.

 

He said there were about a half dozen trees blocking streets along with limbs and other brush throughout the city.  A stretch of Waverly Road near Pine Lake was closed for an extended period from waiting on NIPSCO to arrive and turn off any power flowing through lines brought down by a large fallen tree limb.

 

“This storm wasn’t as bad as others but it was bad enough,” he said.

 

The property damage in LaPorte included the roof of a house struck by huge maple tree toppled during the storm on Darlington St. on the city’s east side.

 

“You can stand in the kitchen and look and see daylight,” said Rich Findlay, 61, who owns the single story home.   

 

Sara Northern, 41, suffered damage to her front porch and mini-van from a large fallen tree at her two story residence on Rockwood St.  She just returned home from work and went upstairs to visit with her children when the tree came down.

 

Northern was trying to contact her insurance company to arrange for repairs to her vehicle.

 

“The windows are broke out.  The doors are bowed. I can’t get in it,” she said.

 

Michigan City Street Director Shong Smith reported at least 25 calls were placed to his office about fallen trees and limbs in the street.

 

Smith said some headstones were also damaged by fallen trees at Greenwood Cemetery.

 

“Crews have been put on mandatory overtime until we have the city cleaned up,” he said.

 

The powerful storm also resulted in thousands of lingering power outages in nearby southwest Michigan.

 

New Buffalo resident Bob Stratton said there have been worse storms but this one was “pretty scary.”

 

Stratton said he saw about a dozen smaller trees laying on the ground along with numerous branches and other scattered debris just during his two mile drive to work at Service 1 Marine inside the state line along Indiana 39 in LaPorte County.

 

The landscape looked as if “a bomb went off,” he said.

 

New Buffalo Mayor John Humphrey said the top half of two old pine trees snapped and landed his yard without causing damage.

 

Humphrey said he also spotted “tons” of fallen trees, including many large ones, along Red Arrow Highway just outside the city.

 

“One of the worse storms in many, many years came through here for sure,” he said.