This in from our news & sister station, WBAP/KLIF News – they’ve gathered reports of the damages across North Texas that were caused by severe storms on Thursday morning.
Sadly, we’ve learned that the Fort Worth Zoo did lose some animals in their bird collection, 5 flamingos were killed by the storm that moved through Fort Worth, along with a couple of ducks, and a pelican. Other birds are being treated in the zoo’s hospital. The Fort Worth Zoo has delayed opening until noon.
A brief Tornado Warning was issued for Parker County around 5:55 a.m.and thousands of homes and businesses in Fort Worth lost power.
The severe weather also forced a ground stop on incoming flights at DFW Airport.
Hail was the big story of the day. The hardest hit area was between Interstates 30 and 20 in southern Tarrant County where 1-2.5″ size hail was reported. That’s nearly the size of tennis balls. Other areas have reported golf ball-sized hail.
11 ambulances and 12 other MedStar vehicles were damaged by hail. “This is going to be a very expensive storm for us,” said MedStar spokesman Matt Zavadsky. “In addition to the vehicles, we also had a fleet of about 30, brand new ambulance chassis that were damaged.” The damaged ambulances have been taken out of service.
The hail also damaged a few of the Arlington Police Department’s patrol cars and the roof of Fort Worth PD’s West Division substation.
