LIBERTY — Workers sought to put the town back together Monday, after a freak storm system Saturday night snapped power lines and pine trees like twigs, and a bolt of lightning ignited a crude oil tank, rocketing its lid into some woods more than 100 feet away.
Amite County Emergency Management Director Grant McCurley documented the damage in a trip up Highway 24 to the scene of the oil fire, then along Highway 569, where a felled tree knocked out power to a city lift station, cutting off water for the northeast part of town.
“We had no idea this was coming. When it hit us, that’s when we knew about it. There were no warnings,” he said.
Magnolia Electric Power Association reported hundreds of members without power after the storm struck at about 6:15. Water was cut off overnight for some residents but back on by Sunday. All power was restored by Sunday morning.
“It was one of those storms that you don’t know where it came from and where it went,” he said.
Clifton Royal, owner of a barbershop and liquor store in Liberty located just across the street from Amite County Co-Op on Highway 24, watched the storm’s duration from one of his shops. He recalled what he saw.
“I watched the whole thing. I saw parts of the tin roof shed on the back of the Amite co-op building being torn off and blown to the front of the store,” he said.
“Part of the roof got caught up in the power lines nearly 20 feet off the ground, causing electrical sparks.”
Royal said he felt the pressure of the lightning strike down the road where the crude oil tank was set on fire about 6:15 p.m.
“You could feel it, the vibration on the ground when the lightning struck,” he said.
At the oil tank site, one of four tanks had visible traces of fire running up and down it’s south side, while another’s lid caught fire, but remained attached.
All three tanks at the Bridger Logistics site will need to be replaced, McCurley said.
When the lightning struck, it ignited natural gas coming from the tank, and that blew the lid off.
A visible trail of broken tree branches where the lid went in close to 30 feet above the ground could be seen in the woods. The lid of the tank, easily weighing hundreds of pounds, sat about 25 yards into the woods.
The bottom of the two tanks that caught fire were warped off their foundation and lopsided. The energy given off bent their metal frames upwards off their foundation.
Once he realized a crude oil tank was involved, McCurley called in the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality. Four fire departments worked to prevent the fire from spreading and getting on the ground. Fire units used about 30 pounds of firefighting foam to put the fire out about an hour and half later.
“Sometimes the best thing to do in a case like this is to let it burn itself out. But we talked with a company representative about how to approach the fire, and we got it out,” he said.
Driving down Highway 569, four Magnolia Electric trucks were working on power lines and clearing debris.
No one was injured in the storm system, which is surprising, given the storm’s intensity, McCurley said.
“No tornado touched down, but there was rotation in the clouds, so there was tornadic activity, it just never made contact with the ground,” McCurley said.
Liberty Mayor Ricky Stratton said the power of the winds blew a mobile home off its foundation near his home.
