Winds roar through Sanpete, damaging trees, property
Century old evergreens, gravestones upended in Manti City Cemetery
Robert Stevens
Managing editor
5-11-2017
Powerful wind gusts tore out trees, toppled power lines, sent a trampoline sailing into the air, knocked trailers off their blocks and cause power outages for some county residents over the weekend.
Manti City may have been hit the hardest by the gusts, which peaked early Saturday evening. Sources from Mid-Utah Radio reported steady winds in Manti at 56 mph with gusts reaching over 75 mph.
“The main damage was trees that were lost at the temple and at the cemetery,” Manti City Administrator Kent Barton said.
According to Barton, all four of the trees that flopped over onto the ground at the cemetery were more than 100 years old, having been planted by pioneers as early as the 1880s.
“We already removed the trees, but the stumps still need to go,” Barton said Monday. The trees fell so that they didn’t damage any headstones or graves badly. We will have to fix the grass damaged by the long roots the fallen trees had, but we hope that will be all fixed by Memorial Day.”
On the temple grounds, 14 trees were pushed over by the strong gusts. More than 50 volunteers cleaned up in the aftermath on Monday.
According to Ted Olson, Snow College professor and local weather observer, winds gusts in Ephraim were as high as 47 mph.
The damage there was limited mostly to two power poles, one near 500 N. 700 East, and one on U.S. 89 between Ephraim and Manti. The pole on U.S. 89 reportedly crashed into the road in the path of oncoming traffic, but no one was injured.
“The two poles were damaged, but we didn’t lose power. They have both been replaced now,” Ephraim Power Superintendent Corey Daniels said.
Although Mt. Pleasant City workers say the did not receive any reports of wind damages or power outages, nearby Spring City had some problems.
LurLynn Potter, Spring City treasurer, says a large pine tree was torn down by the wind and fell into a power line, which left the city without power for a few hours around 6 p.m. on Saturday.
According to Gunnison City Treasurer JoAnn Taylor, there were no reported issues from wind damages in the Gunnison Valley.
