Barnstead, Alton, New Durham slammed by storm

"I remember the hurricane of 1938," said George Cheney, whose home on North Barnstead Road overlooks Locke Lake. "Trees fell like soldiers, but this is worse."

Cheney's house and cars were draped in trees and branches felled by what officials say may have been a tornado that ripped through the Alton-Barnstead-New Durham area yesterday. The path of the storm ran diagonally from the southwest to the northeast and cut a relatively narrow swath. Some properties looked untouched while others nearby were littered with fallen trees and branches.

Two large oaks, which had stood sentinel in Cheney's front yard, had been tossed like pick-up sticks by the storm, one covering the lawn and the other blocking the road.

"Everything was white," said George's wife Claire, recalling the dramatic weather event. "The house shook. Trees came flying through the air, into the bedroom and sunporch."

Taking in the scene, she remarked, "It is like looking outside and seeing somewhere we never lived before. We could never see the house next door."

State meteorological experts may still be trying to figure out if central New Hampshire experienced a tornado yesterday morning but John Robbins had little trouble believing one had hit his home on Winwood Road.

“I saw signs of (wind) rotations on the walls of my second floor,” he said after he looked inside his residence to make sure his pet cat was all right. “Every piece of timber on my property is on the ground… It’s all gone.”

Wayne and Cathy Fraser, who lives just a short distance away on Stockbridge Corner Road in Alton, had the same kind of reaction.

“There was this ungodly sound — and then every tree on (nearby Route 28) came down around our house,” Cathy Fraser said, still in shock more than an hour afterwards. “Two branches, like javelins, went right through the roof into (the upper story) bathroom and bedroom.”

Alton Police reported that a tornado might have touched down in the Merrymeeting River Mobile Home Park off Route 11 around 2:37 p.m. There was “severe structural damage on several properties,” according to Chief Philip A. Smith Jr.

Some Alton residents reported seeing a funnel cloud.

Whatever it was, the quick-moving storm brought a slew of damage to local neighborhoods, stretching from Merrymeeting Lake in New Durham through Stockbridge Corner in Alton and to the Locke Lake neighborhood in Barnstead. Large old trees — particularly grand old pines — were felled by the wind and rain, sometimes being lifted from their roots before landing on homes, vehicles, utility wires and roads.

Some people in Alton reported being trapped in their cars by the road debris. A portion of Route 28, one of the main commuter roads to and from Concord, was shut down from the area around Stockbridge Corner to the intersection with Hamwoods Drive in Barnstead from around noon, when the harsh weather first attacked, until after the evening rush hour.

“This was a highly destructive storm causing a tremendous amount of damage in a short period of time,” Gov. John Lynch said at an evening news briefing. Lynch confirmed that a woman had died in Deerfield from the weather event and that at least a dozen other people around the state were injured, although he did not give any details about the injuries.

Some residents, particularly those on Windwood Road in the Locke Lake development and people living in cottages on Ellie Point in New Durham, had to find other accommodations for the night because of the damage in the neighborhoods. (Prospect Mountain High School in Alton served as an emergency shelter.) Officials indicated it could be several days before the road debris was completely cleared away.

As harrowing as it was to see the damage, the accounts of some people victimized by the weather were just as riveting.

Gina Teolis, who lives on Chamberlain Street just off Stockbridge Corner Road, said she’d just left her house and was driving her car the short distance to the intersection with Route 28 when she noticed something unusual.

“The trees and leaves just started spraying around, like in a strong wind,” she said. “Then it just started pouring rain. I couldn’t see, so I backed into this driveway. Then something told me, ‘Hit the gas.’ I did, and a second later a huge tree fell right where I’d been parked! If I hadn’t moved it would have crushed me.”

Teolis still had to call 911 because she was trapped in her car, with trees on both sides and a downed electrical wire next to her front door.

Doug Knibbs of the Alton Highway Department had a similar experience. He said he and a colleague were driving down Spring Road with the aim of making sure culverts were cleared in the lakeshore neighborhood. As he turned onto Hollywood Beach Road he heard a radio report of a tornado warning for the area. Less than a quarter-mile later, it hit his truck and “battered it pretty hard,” he reported.

“It was perfectly clear and then the wind started blowing, and leaves and branches were all over,” he related. “The rain was coming down in sheets and I couldn’t see a thing. Then a tree dropped down in front of us and there were wires on the truck. I took a chance and jumped out.”

Merrymeeting Lake in New Durham was at the northern end of the storm’s path. A cluster of six summer cottages had their roofs either missing or smashed, with trees lying on top of them. “The storm wiped us out,” said Nancy Madden, a summer resident from Middleton, Mass. “It’s just a mess.”

As for Robbins, when he tried to return to his home he was forced to wait for some time on Peacham Road while tree-cutting crews and workers from Public Service of New Hampshire (PSNH) tried to clear away the large pine trees and wires lying across the street. Hours after first hearing of the event on the television, the homeowner still appeared shocked. He said his street was in even worse condition than Peacham.

“It took a direct hit,” he said. “Winwood Road number seven is a partial collapse… It’s beat up pretty bad.”

Indeed after a sudden downpour forced the workers to take a short break late in the afternoon, a look at the road revealed that nearly every home near the Peacham Road intersection was hammered by the storm, with large trees branches lying on top of roofs, vehicles, decks and yards.

Wayne Fraser had the same kind of reaction looking over his Alton home, which was surrounded by down pine trees.

“It smells like Christmas,” said his wife Cathy. But it didn’t feel like Christmas after the couple heard a large crack from one of the few trees left standing in their backyard.

“There are more that are going to fall,” Wayne said ominously. “This could be going on until midnight… Look at that one, it’s just leaning towards the house. It’s going to fall at some time.”

Locke Lake was one of the hardest hit neighborhoods but despite the chaos and damage, most people appeared open and cheerful, much like after a heavy snowfall when neighbors get out to shovel and talk to one another.

The Cheneys’ next-door neighbor Mike Troy recalled that when the storm struck he tried to get into his house through the garage but couldn't open the door. "There was too much suction," he said. "I couldn't pull it open until my daughter pushed from the inside."

When the storm subsided Troy went to check on the Cheneys. "I put my foot through their lattice climbing up to their porch," he said, explaining that fallen trees blocked the doors to their house and the couple could not get out.

Further up the street Amanda Churchill said shortly before the storm arrived a friend at work on a paving job nearly called her to say “there is a tornado and it's coming straight at me.” She said the force of the storm blew a fan out of a window while her daughter, Ashley Young, who was visiting from California, added, "Trees were flying around our house."

But, apart from the window fan and fallen trees in the yard the home was spared.

A neighbor, Kevin Emond said, "I was driving home and kept hearing these tornado warnings but I didn't see nothing." Then he arrived to find several large trees lying across his driveway and another leaning against his house. As Emond surveyed the havoc he noticed that several hummingbirds had returned to the feeder hanging from the eaves.

On nearby Nutter Circle Chuck Sabella smiled as he picked his way through the fallen trees and scattered limbs strewn across his front yard.

"I've lived in Florida and been through some hurricanes. When I heard the sound, felt the house shaking and saw the trees falling and flying past the window, I knew this was a tornado with winds of more than 100 miles per hour," he said, pointing to a large pine that crushed his van. "If you think this is bad you should see the backyard."

"My boat saved my truck and my car," said Jim Doucette, who lives across the street, where the trunk of large tree lay in the cockpit of his boat while its branches shrouded his truck.

Clambering over a broken fence and tangled limbs, he pointed to his backyard, which was filled with trees. "My wife was at the back of the house when it came through," he said. "If those trees had been a little taller . . ..”

During the day, Governor John Lynch declared a state of emergency in Belknap and four other counties due to damage created by the severe weather and called on the NH National Guard to aid in the emergency. The state’s Emergency Operations Center in Concord was opened and federal disaster officials were seen in Alton assisting local police and fire, State Police, Fish & Game Department staff and other safety-related state agencies. Later Lynch inspected the damaged area by helicopter.

After the storm — which some people called the worst weather event to hit the Lakes Region since the Ice Storm of 1998 — the National Weather Service indicated it was still trying to determine whether a tornado was responsible for the damage. Whatever it was, officials said the incident stretched from about 10 miles east of Concord to behind the eastern end of Lake Winnipesaukee near the Maine border.

Before the storm the weather agency had issued a tornado warning. Meteorologist Kirk Apffel said the weather service would be evaluating data today for evidence of whether the wind was from one direction, which would suggest a microburst, or two directions, which could indicate a tornado, had occurred. (The agency says New Hampshire typically has one or two small tornados touch down each year.)

At 8:45 p.m. Thursday, PSNH reported having service problems in Alton, Barnstead, Franklin, Sanbornton and Tilton.

New Hampshire Electrical Coop reported outages in Alton, Barnstead, Moultonborough and Sanbornton.

Fairpoint Communication counted about 6,000 customers without power last evening, indicating that it could be days before some would see their service resumed.

Meanwhile Jay Fitzpatrick, principal of Prospect Mountain High School, said about a dozen people had been in and out of the designated shelter by early evening but he expected the numbers to increase as people returned from work to find either they could not reach their homes or they were without power and water. "We're set up for all night and just waiting to see how great the need is," he said.

Mary Lou Johnson of Melrose, Mass., who was at the shelter, said she and her family have summered on Half Moon Lake in Barnstead for the past 35 years and not long ago her daughter, Maureen Imbrescia, bought a cottage two doors away on Rustic Shores Road. The two women had taken Imbrescia's four daughters shopping for back-to-school shoes in Tilton early in the day. When they returned they found their way home blocked by fallen trees and downed wires and decided to decamp at the shelter.

"My husband is at home," Johnson said, as the two worked a pair of cell phones trying to determine if the roads were cleared. "They told us they checked everyone but we haven't been able to reach him," she said tearfully.

(The Associated Press contributed to this story.)