North Hills hard hit by Sunday's storms, more on the way

The heavy storms that rumbled through the region on Sunday brought intense rain mixed with hail and winds that knocked large trees into power lines and across roadways.

Francesca DeAngelis-Witchko and her husband were grilling outside in McCandless when the hail storm hit.

Then, their basement flooded.

“Our backyard, it was basically a river,” she said. “It just started seeping into our basement and it came in through a bunch of our walls.”

Their basement has about 4 inches of water, with puddles still sitting on the floor Monday morning. They have fans running, but they’re concerned about the damage and potential mold.

DeAnelis-Witchko said she’s heard about fallen trees, power outages and flooding throughout the area.

“We have a lot of debris in our yard, lots of leaves and sticks,” she said.

McCandless officials reported that a tree fell onto an SUV along Cumberland Road near UPMC Passavant. The road was closed Monday morning while crews cleared the tree and towed the vehicle away.

A number of fallen trees also were reported along Center Oak Drive and Old Kummer Road, which was closed off while debris was being removed.

The town’s public works department planned to have crews out over the next several days to chip any storm debris residents could drag to the sides of the road.

Winds of between 60 and 70 mph were recorded, and quarter-size hail was reported, according to the National Weather Service’s Pittsburgh region office in Moon Township.

Meteorologist Jenna Lake said there were widespread reports of damaging winds and flooding from the nearly 2 inches of rain that fell in southern Allegheny County.

Several areas were hit hard by hail, she said, with inch-sized stones reported in Wexford.

Showers and thunderstorms are expected to develop and move through the area from north to south between 3 and 8 p.m. today, according to the weather service.

Peter Eck of Ross said he saw small hail followed by heavy rain that made the visibility “almost zero.”

A healthy oak tree, which he estimated to be about 50-feet tall, fell in his yard because of the damaging winds.

“We were very lucky, all things considered,” he said. “If it had gone about 90 degrees the other angle, it would have fallen directly onto my house.”

A Ross public works official said residents prevented roadways from being shut off to traffic after Sunday’s storms by grabbing chain saws to cut fallen trees and move debris out of the lanes.

Public works crews also planned to make the rounds to collect and chip debris.

North Park Pool was closed Monday because of a power outage, according to a tweet from Allegheny County.

Duquesne Light reported that more than 22,000 customers lost power at the height of the storms. It had line workers and contractors out working to restore service.

The power was back by 3 p.m. for all but a handful of customers.