Jefferson, Gage, Other Southeast Nebraska Counties Included in Governor’s Disaster Declaration

By Gordon Hopkins On Wednesday, August 20, Governor Jim Pillen signed a disaster declaration for 23 counties recovering from the thunderstorms and high winds that struck the state earlier this month, August 8 through 11, including Jefferson, Gage, Thayer, Fillmore and Saline counties.Other counties covered include Burt, Butler, Cass, Dodge, Douglas, Harlan, Johnson, Lancaster, Nemaha, Nickolls, Otoe, Pawnee, Sarpy, Saunders, Seward, Washington, Webster and York. This disaster declaration will make state funds available to those counties. Governor Pillen said the estimated cost to repair damage from the storms so far is more than $24 million. Winds of more than 80 miles per hours (mph) toppled trees and power poles, damaged structures and left thousands without power, some for nearly 48 hours.While there were some downed branches and power outages, Jefferson County overall was spared the brunt of the storms, according to Jefferson and Saline County Emergency Manager John McKee. He noted that winds had begun to diminish by the time they hit Jefferson County, “I know there's just some trees down, some power outages, which is going to happen with winds. we were lucky enough that the storm started dying to our west a little bit.” McKee said, “I think we were at 65 (mph), that was the highest wind speed we had, and west of us was in the 80s, almost 90.” Saline County was not nearly so lucky.“That Northwestern area was bad,” said McKee. “The whole town of Friend, every yard, you couldn't see the grass because of leaves, tree branches. There were trees on cars, trucks. There were trees on houses, laid over. Trees uprooted. Big, huge, trees broken off downtown, I know at least one business lost a roof. The bank had some damage.” Roads had to be closed due to downed power lines. McKee said, “That high voltage line that comes from the west, going east, north of friend, and crosses Highway 6. It blew a whole bunch of poles down on it, so the wires were laying across Highway 6.”The storms damaged two housing units at the Nebraska state penitentiary, displacing 387 prisoners, according to a statement from the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services. There were no reported injuries.

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