Ronnie Adams has lived in his house in Red Bank for 45 years.
"That was the worst I've ever seen," he said of storms that caused a tornado, several house fires, a barn fire and left more than 19,000 people without power at some point in Chattanooga and the surrounding area Tuesday night.
A tree in Adams' front yard fell onto Lynda Drive, damaging a wall alongside his driveway. He's just happy the tree didn't fall the other way, onto his house.
"I guess God's not quite done with us yet," the 70-year-old Adams said.
The tornado was spotted a couple of counties to the east, in Monroe County, Tenn. The EF-1 had winds that reached 90-95 miles per hour, the National Weather Service said, and occurred just west of New Highway 68, causing large trees to uproot and snap. It had a path of 200 yards, a length of 7.8 miles and lasted 12 minutes.
No injuries were reported.
At 5 p.m. Wednesday, power was restored to EPB's last 150 customers who were still without it, spokesman John Pless said. The concentration was in the Red Bank area, which was hit hard by the storm.
Of the 19,060 people who lost power during the storm, 12,317 were without power for longer than five minutes and 6,743 had it automatically restored within five minutes, Pless said.
A house in the Ooltewah area at 4808 Alabama Road was struck by lightning, causing a fire, officials said. The fire department had the blaze under control within 30 minutes and no one was injured.
Officials reported trees down across the region, with the most hard-hit areas north and west of Chattanooga. Bradley County Sheriff's Office spokesman Ed Ramsey said the storms caused "the usual" wind damage but there were no reports of major property damage.
"People are actually getting tired of that kind of weather," Ramsey joked.
Coffee County officials said winds toppled trees onto some homes and cars in the Hillsboro area, while Bledsoe, Grundy, Franklin and Rhea counties escaped major problems with scattered downed trees and power lines. Winds blew down trees in McMinn and Polk counties, too, but didn't cause major damage. A tree did minor damage to a car in Polk, officials said.
Marion County Emergency Management Agency director Steve Lamb said most wind damage there was in the Whitwell, Powells Crossroads and Haletown areas. Fallen trees damaged a couple of cars in Whitwell, Lamb said. There were a few power outages in the northern part of the county, he said.
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Meigs County Emergency Services Director Tony Finnell said the barn fire at Jim Hagler Farms on the north end of the county about a mile east of the junction of highways 58 and 68 in Ten Mile, Tenn., destroyed a couple of harvesters, bush hogs, a farm tractor, cattle holding pens, a feed grinder and about 3,000 bales of hay.
Otherwise, Finnell said, winds knocked over a few trees and flooded ditches washed out a couple of driveways. Firefighters battled the barn fire most of the night, and it was still smoldering as mop-up efforts continued Wednesday.
Hagler said he was eating dinner with his wife in nearby Harriman, Tenn., when one of the farm employees, Robert Cardwell, called him after spotting the barn roof aflame.
When Hagler left the barn Tuesday evening there was a flash-flood stream running through the middle of the barn that would soon become an inferno, he said.
With the hayloft in flames, Cardwell and fellow employee Darrell Wyrick sprang into action, using a water tank to drench the building next to the burning barn, Hagler said.
Meanwhile, the 3,000 burning hay bales in the barn loft collapsed onto the six pieces of farm equipment below, destroying everything. A group of 10 young bulls who made their home in the barn escaped the blaze to go stand in a small stream out of reach of the fire.
The hay fire will continue to burn for another few days, Hagler predicted.
"The silver lining is that no people were hurt and no animals were hurt," he said praising the efforts of volunteer firefighters and his employees.
Sequatchie County Sheriff's Office Detective Jody Lockhart said winds downed trees all over Cagle and Fredonia mountains, east of Dunlap, and lightning started a fire at a home on State Route 399 that was quickly snuffed out. An electrical fire was triggered by downed power lines at a home on Harmon Drive in Dunlap, Lockhart said. That fire also was quickly contained.
"Some of the deputies were carrying chainsaws with them to clear the trees off the roads," Lockhart said. A Signal Mountain police car parked at the Sequatchie County Justice Center sustained minor damage by a fallen tree, he said.
Contact staff writer Evan Hoopfer at ehoopfer@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6731.
Contact staff writer Ben Benton at bbenton@timesfreepress.com or twitter.com/BenBenton or www.facebook.com/ben.benton1 or 423-757-6569.