The Courier-News from Bridgewater, New Jersey • Page 8

A-8 Saturday, October 20, 1990THE COURIER-NEWS FROM THE FRONT PAGE Cleanup efforts continue I A C.y i David Byron supports his 11 -year-old daughter, Sara, as she returns from the hospital yesterday. She was alone in her house when the tornado struck and was blown out into the front yard moments before the house blew apart. She received 1 50 stitches to close wounds on her legs, arms, back and head. Authorities throughout Central Jersey continued yesterday to clean up the wreckage caused by Thursday night's severe wind and rain storm. The worst damage occurred in Montgomery, where winds leveled one house and extensively damaged four others.

Other towns also experienced their share of downed trees and power lines. Two of the hardest-hit towns in Somerset County were Franklin and Hillsborough. In Franklin, much of the damage occurred in an area off Amwell Road and Cedar Grove Lane in the township's Middlebush section. The wind blew open the front door of a home on Jimmy Court, off Grouser Road, where furniture, pictures and small objects were blown around. A falling tree damaged the roof of an Amwell Road residence and caused minor damage to a car.

And in an area off Cedar Grove Lane near Amwell Road, trees and power lines were knocked down. In Hillsborough, the wind knocked down trees at three houses on Mul-ford Drive in the Belle Mead section. Police said tornado-like winds shattered a 40-foot-high maple tree at a vacant house at 15 Mulford Drive, tossing limbs and branches for distances of 100 feet or more. A large tree behind the house was uprooted, and damage was estimated at $800. Several large trees were toppled at 11 Mulford Lane, where sections of roof drains and downspouts were pulled away from the house, and flower pots were scattered on a rear patio.

Damage was estimated at $3,000. In Union County, extensive tree damage prompted officials to request that pedestrians stay out of Warin-anco Park in Roselle this weekend while the damage is cleaned up. STORM Continued from Page A-1 destructive and the tornado Thursday was the worst. Dumpsters will be brought into the area so residents can begin pushing debris into the street. The township will provide bulldozers to clear the streets, Kress said.

The first level of cleanup should be complete within about 30 days, and the demolition should be complete in about 90 days, Kress said. He estimated that it would take about nine months before the neighborhood returned to normal. After the tornado, Kress said, some 2,000 to 3,000 people were without power in the northeastern section the township's most populous area. Contributions to those left homeless by the tornado may be sent to Emergency Relief Fund, The Montgomery Evangelical Free Church, P.O. Box 53, Belle Mead, N.J.

08502. Also receiving donations is the Red Cross of Princeton, 182 N. Harrison Princeton, N.J. 08540. j-l Mil i Young tornado victim is back on her feet 1 Sevan By KATHIE FLANNERY Courier-News Staff Writer Courier-News photos by Kathy Johnson Rubble covers a car at Richard Harris' house at 34 DeHart Drive in Montgomery yesterday.

Harris, his wife and two children were injured when the roof over their hallway collapsed in Thursday night's storm. A tornado tore off one side of the house. adding that had his father been home, he might have been killed. Red Cross worker Ben Shimberg accompanied Sara to the hospital and tried to give what comfort he could to the family. "She's a brave little girl," Shimberg said.

The doctors told her she would probably feel the worst yesterday, but that she could return to Orchard Road school Monday, Shimberg said. He said that Sara clung to the stuffed dog rescue workers carry in the truck and asked about her puppy while the doctors worked. "I think we did some good," Shimberg said. Rescue workers managed to save the Byrons' two dogs, but David's rabbit, Bob, wasn't as fortunate. Their month-old puppy, Jake, In the midst of homework, roof flies away MONTGOMERY At the height of the storm Thursday night, Jimmy Madaio and his older brother Robert were in separate rooms of their DeHart Drive home, busy doing their homework.

Then, the ceilings lifted and the alls shook and each of the boys MONTGOMERY Less than 24 hours after 11-year-old Sara Byron was blown from her house, she was up and playing Nintendo at a neighbor's home. "She's really strong," said her brother David, 19. Sara, who re-cieved 150 stitches in her head, back, arms and legs, watched without tears as the doctors pulled shards of glass from her body, her brother said. The Byron house was the most seriously damaged of 19 homes hit by a tornado that touched down on DeHart Drive about 7:45 p.m. Thursday.

Sara was alone in the house at 35 DeHart Drive. She was on the first floor, watching television, when wind battered the house, picked her up and blew her onto the front yard. "She looked down and saw air," David said. When the storm hit, David was working on an essay at Lewis School in Princeton, his sister Ra-chael, 14, was at gymnastics and his mother, Patricia, was out of town. Ordinarily, their father, David, would have been there, but bis train from New York was delayed by the weather.

"She wasn't supposed to be alone," said her brother, David, said. "That's the main thing. People really put it together and help here." -ji'It's hard to face," said his wife, Joyce, who also was coming home from work when the storm hit. She said that when she saw the house, it took something out of her. But once she realized that her children were safe, "the house didn't mean thing anymore." She said that whenever she looks at her damaged house and thinks "What are we going to do?" she just has to look down the street at others who suffered more.

"What will they do?" she asked. Kathie Flannery Shortly afterward, he buried his bird, which was found dead in a dented cage on a driveway. Jimmy's father, Bob, was on his way home from work when the storm struck. He said that first, police tried to stop him from entering the road. He continued on his way only to find the roof lifted from his house and the front of the building slightly torn away.

He said he panicked when the children were not inside and police did not know where they were. He dashed up and down the street and called for his children, whom he found safe at a neighbor's home. "We're all safe," Bob Madaio turned up under a pile of rubbish, and Jake mother, Missy, was found hiding under a fire truck. just -sat still. When the shaking stopped, they found flashlights and made their, way to a neighbor's house.

Yesterday, Jimmy was back outside his house on DeHart Drive. He picked up a green-rubber monster finger with a bright red nail. He tried it on and then tossed it back. "That was mine," he said. David said that when he saw the remains of the flattened building yesterday morning, he thought: "That's Kansas; that's not New Jersey." The first thing he looked for was his stereo, a $5,000 sound system now turned into a $2 one, he said.

David is staying with a friend in Princeton, while the rest of the Once funnel touches ground, it's a tornado family is bunking with their neigh' bors. He said he doesn't know where they'll be living next; all of their relatives live in upper New York By DAN VanATTA Courier-News Science Writer state. HELP: Area rallies storm aid Tornadoes are normally more frequent in the Midwest, where cold, dry air masses are much more common. But Harry Woodworth, National Weather Service meteorologist at Newark, said that trend may be changing. "We've had an increasing number of tornadoes in New Jersey in recent years," Woodworth said yesterday.

"New Jersey had 17 tornadoes in 1989 (including one in Piscataway), which smashed the old record of nine tornadoes set in 1987." Tornado-prone Missouri, on the other hand, had only 13 tornadoes recorded last year. Woodworth said that the Weather Service has maintained statistics on tornado incidence only since 1950. While the number for 1990 "has not yet been compiled," Woodworth said it's sure to be far below last year's record. A new weather service radar system aimed at pinpointing the locations of cyclones and other windstorms has been under development for more than a decade, but has not been tested in the New York metropolitan area. "They've been testing the prototype system out in tornado alley in the Midwest," Woodworth said.

"The way things are going, though, maybe they should bring it to New Jersey." a twister, as opposed to a strong frontal wind, has moved through an area, he said. Downbursts occur when a column of air drops vertically, often tens of thousands of feet, after having risen in a similar manner as a vertical updraft during storms. Officials say a number of tragic airline crashes, including the Pan Am disaster in New Orleans a few years ago, were caused by planes being hit by downbursts on landing approaches when they were too low to recover. "When a downburst comes down on a structure, its force is like a piano falling on a house," said meteorologist Basil Stevens of Ion Weather in Morristown. Severe wind damage can occur even without cyclones or downbursts.

"You can also get heavy damage from wind-fronts, which can gust to 50, 60 or 70 miles per hour for just moments," Stevens said. People exposed to such strong winds are in extreme danger of injury from flying debris. "All types of objects become like bullets" in such winds, Arnesen said. i Tornadoes are "very difficult to predict," Arnesen said, even though "a number of things are always present when they occur." When a strong cold front collides with the warm, moist air of a low-pressure center, tornadoes are common, he said. What makes a tornado a tornado as opposed to a cyclone, a downburst, or just a plain old blasting windstorm? Weather experts say a tornado like the one that occurred Thursday night in Montgomery Township is not a tornado unless or until the spiraling funnel of swirling air touches the ground.

"If it doesn't touch down, it's a funnel cloud rather than a tornado," said Rutgers University meteorologist Keith Arnesen. Both funnel clouds and tornadoes are forms of cyclones, which (in the Northern Hemisphere) are identified by a counterclockwise churning of air. To eyewitnesses, this rotating, ice cream conelike movement is the unmistakable signature of a twister. That's why officials seek out eyewitnesses and look for a circular pattern in storm debris before determining whether a tornado has hit an area, said National Weather Service meteorologist Anthony Gigi. "A tornado is a violent column of air that emerges from a cumulonimbus, or typical thundercloud, during a storm," Gigi said yesterday.

Trees that are "snapped off near the top, or have limbs that have been sheared" are another tip that agents to help residents whose homes were condemned. "I suspect many of the people will need long-term housing as their houses are rebuilt," said office manager Arlene Hauser. The Montgomery Methodist Church also opened its Friday and Saturday rummage sale for free to the affected families. Emily Espail-lat, who serves on the women's committee, said all the families were welcome to come or call to ask for whatever they needed. Among the businesses that pitched in with supplies were Johnson Johnson, Grand Union, Dunkin' Donuts, The Catering Company of Blawen-burg, Foodtown of Rocky Hill, Domino's Pizza, Burger King and Continued from Page A-1 going message telling family and friends that the residents were safe.

It received up to 71 incoming calls, he said. The Red Cross offered coffee, doughnuts and comfort. The agency also helped homeless families find interim shelter until they could find more permanent places to stay. Some families bunked with their neighbors or friends, while others opted for motels. The affected families said neighbors who magically appeared with breakfast, coffee or the offer of a bed were terrific.

In an attempt to find more long-range housing solutions, Schlott Realty of Hillsborough assigned two of its TEACHER: Charged with sexual assault BRUCE: Looking forward to meeting Bradley wanted to heln. PeoDle just want to npw dim. afraid, but he had no indications that Kulat threatened her. "When you're dealing with children, it could be the fear that no one will believe them if they come forward," Bissell said. Benner said she was "massively sad" to hear about the charges against Kulat.

He had no disciplinary actions against him as a teacher, was well known through his long tenure and was respected by colleagues and students, school officials said. He was rally around the Bruce family to help them out." Widespread interest in his progress isn't lost on Bruce. Not only has commuLity support helped the family put a dent in astronomical medical bills that have mounted since the accident, it is what keeps Bruce's spirits high, he said. "It feels so good that people are still thinking about you and care about you," he said. "Geez, what do you say to that? It's great." Before his recent surgery, Bruce was busy taking classes at Raritan Valley Community College, attending hi eh school and colleee sDortine room an average of three times a week between 3:30 p.m.

and 4:30 p.m., the girl told police. Bissell said Kulat covered the window of the classroom door with paper. School officials said they couldn't explain how the alleged incidents occurred in a classroom over a long period of time, since there are a number of teachers who stay after school. The allegations became known Thursday after the girl told a teacher, who then contacted authorities. The complaint states that Kulat "intimidated the victim through his supervisory position as her teacher," but Bissell said he couldn't name spe Continued from Page A-1 depend on a respirator to breathe.

After a year of rehabilitation in Colorado, Bruce returned to his hometown of Martinsville, where he lias been living at the home of his next-door neighbors and lifelong friends, the Dufour family. By Thanksgiving, construction on his own home to accommodate his needs should be complete and Bruce will return home to live with his family for the first time since the accident. The addition is complete with elevator, whirlpool bath and wheelchair ramp and is done except for finishing touches. By tomorrow, flowering bushes and willowy trees will add to the landscape for Buce to enjoy from his Continued from Page A-1 Superintendent Bob Gulick, middle school Principal Jane Benner and McGowan joined Bissell at the press conference yesterday to discuss the situation. Kulat, a shop teacher at the Middle School for 21 years, was formally suspended at an emergency meeting of the school board yesterday, Carey said last night.

Kulat was being held at the county jail in Somerville in lieu of $50,000 bail. The student told police she was forced by Kulat to engage in sexual acts 25 to 30 times between November 1989 and June 1990. The incidents allegedly occurred in the shop class Area landscapers and nurseries have donated shrubbery, equipment and labor for today's all-volunteer project at the Bruce home. Community support for Bruce "has developed over a number of years because he has become such a good friend to so many people and it sort of snowballed after the accident," said Harry Stickle of The Stone Center of Bridgewater, who helped organize the landscape effort. "He was so well-known as an athlete and so well-liked for so long because he was a good all-around individual," Stickle said.

"It's one of those things where you have someone who is so popular in the community that word travels that he needs some help and everyone wants to pitch in. Even peop! who didn't know him not involved in extra-curricular school groups. If convicted, Kulat could receive a maximum 20 years in prison on each of the three first-degree counts and five years on the third-degree count. events and keeping up with his dozens of friends. Meeting Bradley "is a good way to start off again," he said.

cific instances of intimidation. Bissell sid the girl told authorities she was.