Overnight Storms Cause Significant Damage At Stillwater Regional Airport

Strong winds whipped through Stillwater early Friday morning. The winds caused more than a million dollars in damage at Stillwater's Regional Airport.

In total, five OSU training planes were either completely destroyed or damaged from the storms that rolled through Stillwater early Friday. The power of the wind was so strong it moved the chained down planes from their assigned parking spot and congregated them all into one area.

“It literally broke the chains, picked it up, best we can tell flipped it over landed on the aircraft behind me,” said Lance Fortney, flight program manager at OSU

Eighty to 90 mile an hour winds whipped through Stillwater, uprooted planes from their chains, and even moved one plane about 120 feet from where it was parked.

“It picked them up and moved them around and they hit each other so a lot of the damage came from that hitting another plane or hitting the ground,” said Fortney.

A view from above from Jim Gardner in Bob Mills SkyNews 9 HD shows the nearly million dollar damage to the Stillwater airport.

Thankfully insurance will cover those costs, but it will take some time for students to see the new planes.

“I was just like it would have to be our new planes. I was like how unlucky can we get,” he said.

The university estimates unfortunately the cost to replace one is about $375,000.

A sixth plane, not owned by the university, was also damaged.

The storm also uprooted trees and split limbs throughout the city.