Palmetto mobile home park residents woke Monday to sounds of storm, damage to homes
Patty Reding and a friend were in her mobile home at The Coach House mobile home park in Palmetto on Monday morning when they heard the storm.
“It was about 5:15 and my trailer started to rock,” Reding said.
She and her friend went into the mobile home’s bathroom and could hear the strong gusts of wind that would eventually rip off neighbors’ roofs and carports.
They stayed inside until daylight, then Reding went outside to survey the damage. She saw snapped power poles, roofing materials and branches scattered across the grounds.
In her golf cart with her two small dogs Monday afternoon, Reding said the damage from that morning’s storm was worse than what the Coach House community saw after Hurricane Irma last September and the worst damage she’s seen in the two years she’s lived there.
The storm moved through the Manatee County area between 5 and 5:30 a.m. Monday and produced a micro-down burst, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Richard Rude.
The National Weather Service received reports of roof damage, trees and power lines down at Coach House mobile home park in Palmetto along with roof and building damage with trees down in the area of Carlton Inlet Drive in Bradenton.
Across the Palmetto mobile home park, pieces of metal and fiberglass were strewn in yards and on the narrow mobile home park’s roadways. One home had a piece of metal piercing its side, just above a window. A truck and trailer hauled away some of the damaged and mangled metal, and crews worked on damaged power lines scattered in the park.
Electric crews were at the mobile home park making repairs, however the power was still out to many homes at 12:30 p.m.
Not expecting a storm that intense, the sounds woke up John Sherman, who also lives in a mobile home in Coach House. The rain hitting the windows of his home sounded like it was going to break the glass, he said.
“It woke me up, I could feel everything shaking,” Sherman said.
He started to pack up some of his belongings to get out of his house but by the time he made it to the door, the winds died down and the storm was over.
It struck him as odd that the damage was mostly confined to one area of the mobile home park near Desoto Avenue, adding that even behind his home just a couple of streets over, there was little to no damage.
However, he said, damage with intense weather is expected.
“It’s Florida,” Sherman said.
Rude said the area could see some some storms Monday afternoon and likely in the afternoons and evenings throughout the week.
This story was originally published July 23, 2018 at 2:25 PM with the headline "Palmetto mobile home park residents woke Monday to sounds of storm, damage to homes."