Valley residents survey aftermath of wild thunderstorm

HANFORD, Calif. (KFSN) -- People all over the Central Valley were littered with debris after trees and roofs literally went airborne.

For Jerry Boren, it was quick and it was a close call.

"All of a sudden I looked out and that wind was whipping," he said.

He was inside his home when a massive tree uprooted and toppled over just feet away from his front door. It was just that much force, and strong winds Boren says managed to change the course of a 50-foot Chinese Elm.

"It was leaning in the wrong direction so it had to raise it up and deposit it in the other direction I just couldn't believe it," he said.

It created devastation in a matter of minutes.

"I was amazed," he said.

And so was Kenneth Thompson. He lives 20 miles away in Hanford and recorded video when the windstorm swept across his garage.

"I thought it was a tornado that's what I thought," he said. "I thought it just touched down right behind me."

It tore off his metal roof and sent it flying to a nearby field.

"That's where it landed, and it cartwheeled over there," Thompson said.

Video from Skyview 30 shows even more of the devastation. A poultry farm in Caruthers where turkeys were housed was severely damaged.

The National Weather Service says despite what some might think, no tornadoes touched down - just 70 mile per hour winds.

"What happened last night is we had a continuous line of storms move through at a particular rate," Jerald Meadows with the NWS explained.

Still, outside of all the damage left behind, Boren says he has a lot to be grateful for.

"I'm thankful for the fact that I wasn't in Texas or Florida," he said. "This is just nothing to what those folks back there went through."

And Boren says he is especially thankful for the PG&E crews. He says within 30 minutes of the power being knocked out they were out here working on repairs, and by 10 p.m. Tuesday morning he says it was all restored.