DALLAS _ One person was killed and at least five others were injured Sunday afternoon when a crane fell into an Old East Dallas apartment building as storms pummeled parts of North Texas.
Crews searching Elan City Lights apartments found a woman inside an apartment after the crane crashed into the east side of the building, Dallas Fire-Rescue spokesman Jason Evans said. She was later pronounced dead.
Five other people were hospitalized at Parkland Memorial Hospital and Baylor University Medical Center. Two were transported in critical condition, two were in serious condition and one person who was treated for a minor injury and released, Evans said.
The crane, which was being used at a construction site next door, collapsed just before 2 p.m. into the building near U.S. Highway 75 and North Good-Latimer Expressway, Evans said.
Multiple emergency crews responded to help dig through rubble, evacuate residents and search for people and pets who may have been trapped inside the apartments and collapsed parking garage.
"We are currently working to help determine the scope of damage caused by the collapse, and consult with management on what they'll need to do going forward," Evans said in a written statement.
The cause of the collapse has not been confirmed, he said.
Apartment management continued to work Sunday evening to account for all of the building's residents, but there were no reports of any missing people, Evans said.
Attempts to reach the company that owns the apartment complex were unsuccessful.
Yesenia Bosquez's family had moved into their top-floor apartment just two weeks before the crane came crashing through Sunday. She returned from a shopping trip to find her apartment, where she'd left her husband, Jay, to recover from a shoulder injury, crushed by the twisted metal.
It took about 30 minutes for authorities to tell her that her husband had been rescued alive and had been holding their dog while medics worked on his injuries.
"It felt like a year," Bosquez said. An hour later, she still didn't know which hospital he was taken to.
Abbey Kearney and her husband, Shawn, were in their third-floor apartment when the sky quickly went dark. She said they went out on their patio, which overlooks the pool, and saw umbrellas hurtling through the air.
The Kearneys watched from their apartment as the crane fell, crushing units directly across from their patio.
"It was just like a knife through butter," Kearney said. "I'm still just shaking."
She said she was evacuated from her apartment, which was unscathed. Kearney and her husband aren't sure when they'll be able to get back inside to retrieve their two cats or get their cars out of the parking garage.
In a photo Kearney took from the third floor of the parking garage, cars are scattered among the rubble. Some were flipped upside down, and others were nearly vertical.
Isaiah Allen was in his apartment when he heard what he thought was the loudest thunderclap he had ever heard but quickly realized the sound came from the collapsed crane.
"I saw that the crane had actually fell straight through the building and had destroyed a good eight to 10 apartments and so there's like floors and stuff falling through," he said.
Allen said he saw a bloodied woman trapped in her apartment on the second floor.
Steven Cooney said he had been standing on his balcony watching debris fly off a nearby building that was under construction when the crane fell right next to him.
Cooney went to the parking garage, but it had collapsed. As he was leaving the building, he said he saw injured people who were trapped on the balconies.
Residents who were evacuated from the building gathered holding their pets and nothing else. Others said their pets were still inside.
Corey Lark and her husband weren't home when the crane collapsed, but their two dogs, George and Carlos, were.
"I wasn't going to be OK until I had my dogs," she said.
At 5 p.m., police went into her apartment to rescue the dogs. They also asked Lark if there were any other belongings they could grab while they were inside. All she could think to say was her work bag.
Lark is worried that between her apartment and her storage unit on the building's fourth floor, she and her husband have lost all their belongings.
"My husband says we'll just rebuild," she said, wiping away tears.
Officials said family members can reunite with each other at the Latino Cultural Center. It is unclear whether accommodations were being made for the displaced residents.
Police closed streets around the area where the crane had collapsed.
Joshua Gomez, 23, was taking the trash from his third-floor apartment to the chute in the garage when a curtain of rubble came down in front of him.
He ran back to his apartment to find his dog, Lucky, cowering under the bed. Once they were out of the apartment he scooped Lucky up and ran outside, yelling to neighbors along the way.
He doesn't know where they'll stay tonight, or how they'll get there without his brand new truck, which was buried in the rubble.
"I just feel blessed, though," Gomez said. "Thank goodness I got out."
The storms left tens of thousands of residents without power and created problems for 911 call centers across the region.
The call center that serves the city of Dallas was working again by Sunday evening, police said.
Dispatchers were seeing a high call volume, which may result in some residents getting a busy signal when they call 911, police said. In that case, residents should hang up and immediately call back to get through to emergency responders.
As of 3 p.m., more than 250,000 customers were affected by outages in Dallas County alone, about a quarter of the customers Oncor serves.
About 46,000 customers were without power in Denton, Collin and Tarrant counties.
The storms knocked down about 200 trees across Dallas, city officials said. Residents can report downed trees or traffic light issues to the city by calling 311 or using the OurDallas app.
In downtown Dallas, several windows were shattered on the north side of the Fountain Place highrise and a building under construction at 1401 Elm St.
The storm had moved south of Dallas by 4 p.m., leaving behind a mess of downed trees, street flooding and wind damage for residents to clean up.
Rain was not the main issue in many parts of Dallas and surrounding cities, though some street flooding was reported.
Less than half an inch was recorded at DFW International Airport and Dallas Love Field as of 2:45 p.m.
The National Weather Service recorded a 71-mph gust at Dallas Love Field, where WFAA-TV reported that a hangar door and part of the roof at a Southwest Airlines maintenance facility was torn away. No injuries were reported.
Near the Presbyterian Village North retirement community in Lake Highlands, trees had been uprooted and a stop sign and light pole were blown over.
A billboard was knocked down in Uptown, damaging two vehicles. No injuries were reported.
Jones and two friends pulled into the parking lot when the rain started. Moments later, wind knocked down the billboard, which scraped the right side of Jones's car.
"It just picked up so fast and it was not even raining," Jones said.
The front windshield and back window of Stephanie Carenca's silver Cadillac Escalade were damaged when the billboard fell on top of the SUV.
"All of the sudden, we heard this bang, the lights flickered and it smelled like something was burning," she said.
Carenca was getting ready to leave from lunch at Breadwinners when she saw the billboard land on her SUV. No one was inside when it fell.
"I'm just glad we weren't in it," she said.
Winds of up to 63 mph were also reported in Richardson and 60 mph in Denton. Wind damage was also reported in Rockwall County.
There were also reports of hail damage to windows in Richardson and Collin County, and hail measuring about 1.5 inches was reported in Garland, National Weather Service meteorologist Joey Picca said.
In Carrollton, large poles that appeared to be from a golf course had toppled, damaging neighboring buildings and several vehicles, according to Carrollton Fire Rescue. No injuries were reported.
