ACKWORTH, Iowa — Powerful winds swept through central Iowa early Friday morning, including in Warren County, shredding trees and bending power lines.
Branches lay across highways. Even in smaller towns, hail and wind tore shingles off of homes as well. The storm also split an Ackworth family's huge tree in half, one that had previously been struck by lightning.
Homeowner Victoria Foster, who lives in Ackworth, told Local 5 News she and her husband woke up around 4:30 a.m. to the sound of hail crashing against the surface of their roof and the Earth.
"We got the warning on our cell phones, and on my Apple Watch, and as soon as we got that, the tree fell over and we had no power, and so we were like: 'Oh gosh.' We looked outside the window and the tree was just on the yard," she recalled.
Then Foster said she heard a "bam" noise come from outside. That was the tree crashing against the powerline in their front yard, taking out the family's power in the process.
She said the whole morning was "a little scary because I have two dogs inside the house."
The local fire department came by soon after, helped remove the tree from the powerlines and split their front yard tree into heavy logs, which Foster says are heavy because "it is just so waterlogged."
Crews helped clean up tree branches off of paths, and homeowners' properties all day Friday, and they'll continue to do so into the weekend.