Cleanup after wind, hail storm will take time

By Ken Smith, WRAL anchor/reporter

Fuquay-Varina, N.C. — Four days after high winds swept through Wake County and hail pounded neighborhoods near Fuquay-Varina, people are still cleaning up and assessing the damage on Friday.

“I’ve been through numerous hurricanes here. We’ve had trees down before. I’ve never seen this much debris down,” Lisa Cook said.

Cook’s daughter, Ari Pappas, said driving home after the storm was frightening.

“The hail had come down, and the road was wet, and [with] how humid it was that day, there’s steam all the way across the road, and I couldn’t see 30 feet in front of my car,” Pappas said.

Cook and her family have spent much the week cleaning up, even before she was able to figure out how much repairing storm damage will cost.

“I had the insurance adjuster come out today, and he was showing me where there’s all these dings in the roof,” she said. “This was a 30-year roof put in 10 years ago, and they’re going to have to replace the back side of it just because of how big some of the hail was.”

Cook and Pappas said the hail was a little bigger than golf balls.

Many nearby homes also sustained significant damage. Hail ripped part of the lining off a neighbor’s in-ground pool, for example.

“The driveway was completely covered with leaves. You couldn’t see the driveway,” Sharon Stevenson said.

“It kind of looked a little bit like a hurricane went through there, but on a smaller scale,” said her husband, Jim Stevenson.

Cook said she has relatives coming in this weekend to help her put her garden back together and help with some repairs around the house.