ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, June 25, 1996 TAG: 9606250078
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: FAIRFAX
SOURCE: Associated Press
Winds as high as 70 mph - possibly a tornado - ripped roofs off homes, toppled hundreds of trees and left thousands of people without electricity Monday in Northern Virginia.
``It probably was a tornado, but we don't know yet,'' said Dewey Walston, a meteorologist at the Weather Service station in Sterling.
There were no reports of serious injury after a line of powerful thunderstorms moved east across the densely populated Northern Virginia suburbs about 5 p.m. About 78,000 Virginia Power customers in Northern Virginia lost electricity before the storms pounded Washington, D.C., and its Maryland suburbs.
At least two houses lost roofs in western Fairfax County, near Washington Dulles International Airport, according to television reports. A house in the Sully Station area lost its rear siding.
The Weather Service sent investigators to check the damage from the storm near Centreville, where damage was heaviest and witnesses reported a funnel cloud. Investigators expect to know today whether the storm was a tornado, Walston said.
``There are a lot of trees in different yards than they started out in,'' said William Arends of Centreville.
The Weather Service reported winds of 59 miles an hour at Washington National Airport, which closed for about an hour.
LENGTH: Short : 36 linesby CNB