Gusts cause minor damage

A large sign blew down and a tent was damaged. Trees and power lines also were downed.

By LEON M. TUCKER

© St. Petersburg Times, published November 26, 2000

A Tampa ministry tent packed with holiday items for the homeless was ripped and an 80-foot sign at a Pinellas Park nightclub was toppled by what National Weather Service officials said were early morning winds that reached about 50 mph.

Meteorologist Paul Close said the gusts from the offshore system gave no warning, although they were part of a cold front blowing in from the north and were not unusual for this time of the year.

"As the rain was moving out, that's where the wind came from," Close said. "It's one of those things that just kind of develops. We're in that time of the winter months where we get those fronts to come in every week or so."

Close said the area received about one-tenth of an inch of rain in the morning. He expects some scattered showers and a possible thunderstorm today, with the greater chances occuring before dawn.

Walter Preston, owner of the Joyland Entertainment Complex at 11225 U.S. 19, said he was in the back part of the 60,000-square-foot facility when he heard a loud crash at about 9:50 a.m. When he went to investigate, he found the landmark sign had blown over into the parking lot.

"It sounded like a bomb going off," Preston said. "(When) I went outside and saw the sign, I said ... "what else can go wrong?' "

Joyland opened in 1959 as an amusement park and five years later became the Joyland Country and Western Music Center. City officials shut it down last month after finding fire and building code violations but approved the reopening of the Crystal Playhouse Dinner Theatre on Thursday.

Law enforcement agencies also reported downed trees and power lines throughout Pinellas and Hillsborough counties. No weather-related injuries were reported.

In the 2100 block of N Florida Avenue in Tampa, high winds knocked over a 40-foot oak tree and then ripped a 35-foot hole in a Metropolitan Ministries tent, where about $7,000 in toys, food and other merchandise was being kept for needy families.

"There was no major damage done," said Morris Hintzman, president of Metropolitan Ministries. In St. Petersburg, the performance of Nutcracker in the Park in Straub Park got rained out Saturday. There is no rain date.

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