By MARY POLETTI
Herald-Whig Staff Writer
Heavy thunderstorms across the region Sunday night damaged property and felled power lines in several communities in Northeast Missouri, but no injuries have been reported.
The heaviest damage appears to have occurred along the Shelby-Monroe County line, where strong winds snapped utility poles and wreaked havoc on large-scale agricultural equipment in a roughly 15-mile line that passed about a mile and a half south of Shelbina.
Shelby County Presiding Commissioner Glenn Eagan, also the county's emergency management direcor, said about eight to 10 machine sheds sustained heavy wind damage and numerous smaller grain bins were destroyed in wind gusts that also overturned many livestock trailers.
Power was out for eight hours in a large area, Eagan said.
In Hannibal, strong winds heavily damaged a hangar and flipped a private plane at Hannibal Regional Airport, and the storms downed numerous trees, limbs and power lines primarily on the north side of town.
The trees that fell in some locations were so large that one street was closed for five or six hours during the night, Emergency Management Director John Hark said. At least one tree crushed a parked car.
Hark said power outages were "spotty." The Hannibal Board of Public Works said about 200 residents lost power.
To the southwest, several roofs were blown off in wind gusts that appeared to be concentrated just east and southeast of Perry, said Ralls County Sheriff Paul Forney.
The winds also were blamed for an overturned semitrailer on Mo. 19 and widespread reports of other overturned objects.
Hark said Hannibal was "very lucky" to be mostly spared in the intense storms that roiled the region Sunday evening and overnight into Monday.
"We had 70 to 80 mph gusts of wind, and we rode through it," he said. "I don't know how we did, but we did."
Across the Mississippi River in Adams County, the Adams County Electric Cooperative said about 4,800 customers were without power in Quincy, Adams, Burton and Kellerville after a tree fell through power lines just east of Burton. All customers were back online by noon Monday.
-- mpoletti@whig.com/221-3385
