BURLINGTON, Vt. -
Chittenden county's landscape looks different today. Last night's storms tore things up.
Clean up crews have been working non-stop since the damage was done.
"You couldn't see five feet in front of you," Burlington Public Work's Brian Bessette said.
When the lightning struck and the thunder roared Wednesday night, Burlington's Public Works team knew Thursday would be a busy day. All night and well into the afternoon, the trees that had slammed into the center of roads disappeared. "We remove them as fast as we can, because it's a hazard to people,"
In Burlington, the storms may have been short lived, but none the less caused some long term damage. The guys from DJ's tree service spent their morning chopping down what the storm left. "It was over half the tree, so it wouldn't survive so we ended up taking the rest of it," Robert Myers said, of DJ's Tree Service.
From Main Streets to side streets, trees snapped in two and fell on top of houses. Once the damage was assessed, people started picking up the pieces one by one.
We showed you a picture Wednesday night of people literally swimming and floating on rafts in the middle of street. The torrential downpour even left North Willard Street looking more like the Winooski River.
"There was so much that the system couldn't hold it all in one shot," Bessette said.
North Willard Street is no longer a river. The water has since drained, but for one woman's basement, it's a different story.
"It was really, really bad and everything is a mess," Edith Wilkonson said. Water in her basement reached four feet high.
So while the clean up continues, crews are trying to be as thorough as possible so that none of the remnants from the storms fill the drains and causes problems in the future.
Except for cars and houses, there haven't been any injuries reported.
