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Many of those whose only involvement with Wednesday's stormy weather was the loss of electricity and cable/internet service questioned why it took so long to get both restored.  The storm that struck Wednesday afternoon included one confirmed tornado that hit eastern Cleveland County, entered Gaston south of Cherryville, and ended its run near Bessemer City. There were also tornadic winds in other areas that did considerable damage in Dallas, Gastonia, Ranlo, Lowell, and near Belmont. The Weather Service says winds in the tornado and other locations exceeded 100 mph.  

Only one person died as a result of the storm--a woman from York, SC, who was killed when her SUV was struck by a tree that fell on S. New Hope Road near Belmont and hit the vehicle on Dixon Road near its intersection with New Hope.  A passenger in her vehicle was hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries.

Chad Brown, chairman of Gaston County Commissioners, declared a state of emergency Wednesday evening that remained in effect until 5 PM Friday.  The Red Cross opened an emergency shelter at the Citizens Resource Center on the Dallas-Cherryville highway where a little over a dozen people stayed Thursday night.  Many areas were still without electricity that night.  By Friday afternoon, the 45 percent plus outage had been reduced to a little over eight thousand customers.

Schools in Gaston and Cleveland counties were closed for students Thursday; Gaston County Schools also gave students Friday off.  Some roads were still closed and  electric outages were widespread.  The Gaston County courthouse stayed closed on Friday.

NC27 was closed for four hours on Thursday afternoon between Mount Holly and Stanley to allow for utility repairs and removal of fallen trees.  NC275 was closed from Kiser Dairy Farm Road to NC279 in Dallas on Friday for the same reasons. It was limited to one lane traffic much of Saturday as several large trees that had fallen were removed.

The National Weather Service left the possibility of another storm in the forecast for Friday, but none occurred.  Saturday was a sunny day and that was also the forecast for Sunday, but another storm system is expected to bring heavy rain on Tuesday.

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