50 mph Winds Rattle Scarsdale

Freaky April weather brought high winds, lightening, hail and snow to Scarsdale this week, resulting in the cancellation of the Scarsdale Road Race on Sunday and the women's tennis team tryouts on Monday morning.

After temperatures climbed into the 70's on Friday, a cold front swept in with 50 mph winds on Saturday night, rattling roofs and bringing down trees and power lines.

Anthony Di Domenico from the Scarsdale Recreation Department said the decision to cancel the race was touch and go. As it was cancelled early Sunday morning, many runners showed up anyway.

In a comment to Scarsdale10583 he said, "Due to the unsafe weather conditions (very high wind gusts), we were forced to cancel yesterday's race. We had a plan in place for the Scarsdale Police Department to check out the race route for us overnight into the morning hours. A small crew from the Public Works Department was on call in case any tree limbs fell. As of 7:00am Sunday morning we were scheduled to keep the race on despite the snow, rain, and winds because the race route was clear of debris. It wasn't until about 7:30am that high gusts of wind caused a large tree limb and electrical wires to fall on Harwood Court/Brite Avenue, right near the starting line for our 4-mile race.

It was then decided that we risked the safety of our runners, and staff. High winds were expected to continue into the later part of the afternoon, so with that in mind we decided to cancel the event and not put anyone in an unsafe environment.

At this time the Recreation Department is looking into a rescheduled date, There are a few things we need to consider before choosing a date but we are looking into it."

Many trees and powerlines fell on Sunday morning. Here's a list from the police blotter:

• At 6:56 am on Sunday morning a large tree limb fell, blocking Greenacres Avenue. The limb also took down a power line that ignited a fire. The fire department put it out and some residents lost power.
• At 7:05 am a large tree fell and blocked Eton Road.At 7:45 am police received a report that a tree and wires were down on Lincoln Road.
• At 7:49 am a large tree fell at 22 Brookby Road.At 7:51 am a fire was reported on power lines at the intersection of Heathcote Road and Morris Lane.
• At 7:53 am the Department of Public Works cleared a tree blocking the roadway at the intersection of Park and Oxford Road.At 7:56 police received report of a large tree that fell on Sheldrake Road – see the photo above.
• At 8:27 am a large tree branch fell onto the power lines at the intersection of Broadmoor and Griffen Roads.At 9:23 am a Brown Road man saw the power line spark and then lost power.
• At 12:27 pm a tree fell on Gatehouse Road and blocked the road.