COLUMBUS, Ohio — Several central Ohio neighborhoods are continuing to recover after at least three tornadoes touched down early Wednesday morning.
The National Weather Service confirmed EF-1 tornadoes in Hilliard and Madison County near London and an EF-2 tornado in Franklin County and western Licking County near Blacklick.
Days later, the devastation is still apparent in neighborhoods that were in the storm’s path.
The damage has kept Richard Littler and his team of tree trimmers at Absolute Tree Service busy for the last few days.
On Friday morning, Littler was tending to a Blacklick backyard, where the tornado knocked down more than a dozen large trees.
“We hope and pray everybody is OK first, then we just take phone calls, go out as soon as possible, get trees off of houses blocking driveways and everything,” Littler said.
The National Weather Service reported wind speeds of up to 120 mph in the neighborhood. Littler said the damage is some of the worst he has seen in more than four decades in the tree business.
“This was pretty bad, the hardest one I did before was when the hurricane hit in Columbus years ago and that was the worst, but I had some microburst storms I cleaned up that were pretty bad, but this one was.. because it is like one direct line that it went through,” he said.
The cleanup requires teamwork. Littler was assisted by a crew from John’s Tree Service on Friday, which has been equally as busy.
“A lot of cutting a lot of sawing down big maples actually a lot of pine trees than anything,” said Anthony Butler.
The crews had chipped three truckloads of wood from the backyard, with still hours of work to go. They said this storm could keep them busy for the next few weeks.
The communities impacted by the tornadoes do not qualify for FEMA assistance, which requires at least 25 homes to be destroyed.