Syracuse, NY --A series of thunderstorms raked Central New York Tuesday, damaging homes, flooding businesses and basements, forcing the closure of Interstate 81 and spawning what might have been a tornado in Oneida County.
A team will investigate the wind damage today, said meteorologist David Nicosia of the National Weather Service in Binghamton.
Nicosia said this afternoon could bring another outbreak of severe weather.
The first of the storms struck after 3 p.m. Darkened western skies were ripped by bolts of lightning that were quickly followed by gusting winds, hail and a deluge of rain.
Within minutes, water was slicing over roadways. Before 4 p.m., police shut down Interstate 81 because flooding beneath the Butternut Street bridge made the road impassable.
Water and traffic on I-81 forced ambulances from as far away as Jefferson County to use city streets instead of the interstate to reach Syracuse hospitals.
The amount of rain that fell reached 1.79 inches, a record for the date. With four days left, this April is already the second-soggiest on National Weather Service records.
Damage was widespread, particularly in Syracuse, where Upstate University Hospital briefly closed its lobby when a pipe carrying rain water from the roof burst.
Reports of flooding were equally widespread, from the State Tower Building to a carpet store on North Salina Street to homes throughout Onondaga, Oswego and Cayuga counties. Firefighters struggled to keep up with calls. Asked how many reports of flooded basements had come in, Syracuse District Fire Chief Steven Evans said, “right now I’d say we’ve got hundreds.”
Flooding in the basement apparently led to the collapse of a wall of a home at 309 Martin St. Al Sienke said he was cleaning out a drain minutes before the wall collapsed. “It took out the whole back wall, the washer and dryer,” he said.
The walkway along Onondaga Creek in Franklin Square was submerged, the creek’s turbid waters coursed through gaps in the iron fence that lines the walk. On the other bank of the creek, three mallards paddled serenely in high water.
In the midst of the storm, workers at the Atrium building downtown reported seeing storm-drain covers forced out of the ground by water pressure.
Power outages were reported throughout the region, with hundreds of customers affected, according to National Grid.
The National Weather Service reported the storms may have dumped golf-ball sized hail and spawned damaging winds in excess of 60 mph.
Staff writers Robert Baker, Douglass Dowty, John Mariani and Charles McChesney contributed to this report.
Check out more videos from The Post-Standard:
• Syracuse's Onondaga Creek overflows its banks
• Flash Flooding in Downtown Syracuse
• Flooding in Skaneateles
• Hail falls during Tuesday's first Central New York thunderstorm
From the scenes:
• Post your photos and videos to Syracuse.com
• Man sits on top of car at flooded intersection on the east side of Syracuse, near Fayette Street.
• A line of cars on a flooded street on the east side of Syracuse.
• Lightning strikes the State Tower Building, in Syracuse.
• Syracuse University students in a flooded street.
• Flooding on Sumner Avenue near Syracuse University.
• A YouTube video of flooding on James Street in Syracuse.
• Taking shelter in a cemetery.
• At Boxcar Press in Syracuse.
• Storm over Syracuse by Aaron K. Gould
• Dark clouds over North Syracuse
This is the view, looking north, from the Butternut Street overpass to I-81, where heavy downpour flooded this section of the interstate. This is just north of the Clinton Street exit in Syracuse.