NWS called after trees uprooted, homes damaged during overnight storms

JEFFERSON, S.C. — The National Weather Service has been contacted about significant damage from overnight storms that hit Chesterfield County, South Carolina.

In Jefferson, several homes and a business were damaged by falling trees and strong winds.

Chesterfield County emergency officials have been out in the community since 4 a.m. assessing the damage. Fortunately, no injuries have been reported.

Chuck Raley lives in the county and told Channel 9′s South Carolina bureau reporter Greg Suskin that he woke up to the feeling of something falling on him.

“The ceiling in my bedroom fell. Pieces of it hit me, and I jumped up,” Raley said.

He said he didn’t have time to get to a safer spot, before two large pine trees crashed into his home on Ogburn Drive in Jefferson.

Immediately, he was glad he was alone in the house. One tree came through the kitchen into a bedroom where his grandchildren often spend the night.

“The grandkids. The tree fell through one of their bedrooms, and it went all the way through their room, so it’s a good thing they weren’t here,” he said.

The severe weather that left flooding, damage, and thousands of people without power across the Charlotte area, hit the small town of Jefferson hard.

If you drive down Main Street, Ogburn Drive, Baker Street, and others, you can see huge trees have fallen down -- some on houses. Roofing tiles are a common site in the street and on in the grass.

Erica Funderburk heard the wind picking up outside her home before midnight.

“It was getting stronger and stronger, and sounded like it was closer and closer,” she said.

By close to 4 a.m., it was worse. She said she sat up in bed, planning to rush over and wake her children.

“Before I could get out of the bed good, it hit. My son screamed and I screamed and the whole house just shook,” she said.

On every street impacted by the storm, there were neighbors helping neighbors clear debris, and people checking on each other.

The clean up will take days, but there’s a blessing there too.

Calvin Clark drove down from Pageland first thing in the morning to check on his mother. Her house had only minor damage.

“Her house is OK,” Clark said. 'It’s crazy, but we were blessed that no one got hurt."

Across town on Highway 151, is the well-known Smokehouse Grill BBQ restaurant. On Thursday afternoon, there was twisted metal everywhere, even in trees and napkin dispensers tossed out on the grass. The roof of the restaurant was partly torn off in the storm.

“It’s heart breaking. It really is,” said owner Clay Courtney. He and his father just reopened the restaurant February 1, then were forced to close it last month like every other restaurant in the state, then the storm hit. Rain poured in through the damaged roof.

"We had about six weeks that we were open, " Courtney said. “I’ve already started ripping out the walls and stuff where the water was coming in. I want to get everything stripped out and dried out.”

The National Weather Service told Chesterfield County Emergency officials that the damage was caused by very strong straight-line winds.

The NWS did not see evidence of rotation on radar that would indicate a tornado. However, experts had not come to take a look at the damage as of late Thursday.

Check back with wsoctv.com for updates on this story.

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