OAKLAND Illinois - The community of Oakland was filled with the sounds of chainsaws and heavy equipment Saturday morning, as this small town at the northeast corner of Coles County recovered from damage from high winds that rolled through the area Friday night.

“It only lasted a minute or two,” said Sophia Turner, 9, who lives on Maple Street with her parents Jack and Lori, 2 sisters and brother. “I woke up my Mom because I was scared.” The Turners were still without power Saturday morning, as Ameren CIPS crews worked in their back yard and across the street to bring in new cables to replace those downed when the massive live oak tree in the Turner’s back yard was pulled from its roots.

Damage in Oakland appeared to be limited in two straight lines – one running along Washington Street, and the other starting in the city park on a beeline toward the Turner home about one-quarter of a mild to the east. The storm passed through town around 9:30 p.m. according to people who were in the areas damaged.

City workers Roger Hale and Randy Duzan were busy clearing the intersection of Washington Teeter Streets at 6:30 a.m., and portions of Washington Street to the west of the intersection were still barricaded closed due to fallen trees. “It all happened so fast,” said Mindy Bell who lives at the intersection. “I looked out back when I heard a loud crack, and the neighbor’s tree was on fire where it was hitting the power lines,” she said. “CIPS was out by 10, they were here really fast.”

Workers at Crop Production Services were clearing debris from a damaged storage building that blew onto their lot from the adjacent McQueen lumberyard, working around a downed power line that was draped across one of CPS’s crop sprayers “CIPS has killed the power to it,” said Harold Staggs, who works for CPS. “We don’t know when they’ll be back to get it hooked up, but they were here last night.”

According to Hale, most of the trees seemed to have been snapped off by high winds, but some of the damage, especially where trees were snapped off near the top, showed signs of being twisted off. “We don’t know what hit us,” Hale said.

The National Weather Service office in Lincoln could not be reached for comment.