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A section of the roof at Falmouth Inn was torn off during a storm that passed through Sunday. (Derek Davis/Staff Photographer)

Kaley Petros wasn’t home when a strong thunderstorm moved through Gorham on Sunday afternoon, but by the time she got home a couple of hours later, she suspected her house would not be left unscathed.

She’d seen Facebook posts from neighbors about a roof that was ripped off a nearby house and trees that sustained heavy damage. But it was still a bit of a shock to see her property.

“Before I even got into the driveway, I knew something was going to be gone,” Petros said Monday afternoon as crews worked to clean the roughly one dozen mature trees in her yard that toppled over or were otherwise broken by the storm. And though her house was largely spared, several outbuildings on her property were damaged.

Sunday’s storm felled roughly a dozen trees on Kaley Petros’ property in Gorham, damaging some outbuildings but largely sparing her house. (Derek Davis/Staff Photographer)

The fast-moving storms Sunday prompted severe thunderstorm warnings in Cumberland and York counties, where there were reports of hail and trees falling on houses. Roofs were ripped off at least two buildings in southern Maine.

In a widely circulated video posted on Facebook, a person driving through Gorham captured tree branches falling in the road as a roof peeled off a house and crashed to the ground. A roof was also ripped off part of a commercial building in Falmouth, officials said.

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The storm forced organizers to shut down the Yarmouth Clam Festival just before 3 p.m. as lightning moved into the area. Festival staff evacuated rides and two shelters were opened, but no injuries were reported.

Yarmouth emergency officials went to the festival area during the storm and also responded to two structure fires caused by lightning strikes, according to fire-rescue officials.

The Falmouth Fire-EMS department responded to 13 calls related to the storm that rolled through town just before 3 p.m. Callers reported that three trees fell on one house, that a tree fell on a car as it was being driven and that the roof came off part of a commercial building on Route 1.

A section of the roof at the Falmouth Inn that was torn off by a storm Sunday. (Derek Davis/Staff Photographer)

No one was injured in those incidents, fire-EMS officials said in a Facebook post that included a photo of the roof on the ground next to a brick building.

The National Weather Service received multiple reports of trees falling in Cumberland County, largely concentrated in Windham. Those reports included trees on houses on Leisure Lane and Ridge Road in North Windham and multiple trees down along Route 302 in South Windham near the Westbrook line.

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Chief Brent Libby of the Windham Fire-Rescue Department said his crews received about 25 calls for service during the storm, mostly from people reporting trees and power lines that were down.

“That’s a busy road on a Sunday afternoon,” he said. “Having to close it because of trees and power lines down was a bit inconvenient for folks.”

There was some localized flooding because the rain came down so fast, but that didn’t last long, Libby said. There were no injuries related to the storm damage, he said.

In Gorham, the weather service received reports of trees falling on a house on Canal Street and of a roof coming off a house on Mosher Road.

A worker from AK Fickett Tree is lowered Monday onto several large trees that fell onto an outbuilding at a residence in Gorham a day earlier as storms swept through southern Maine. (Derek Davis/Staff Photographer)

Petros, who lives in another home on Mosher Road, said she’s grateful none of the trees crashed into her house, though the main entrance was blocked by a tree when she got home. But a tree did come down through the roof of her barn and on top of the garage, blocking the door. A window in the house was broken, and the porch railings were torn off, she said.

“The big bummer was our backyard utopia for our kids,” Petros said. The swing set and sandboxes are in rough shape, and the above-ground pool will likely need to be removed.

The National Weather Service issued the first warnings for York County shortly after 2:30 p.m. Sunday, cautioning people to watch out for 60 mph winds and hail. Additional warnings were issued in southeastern Cumberland County a few minutes later, according to the weather service.

The weather service office in Gray was still collecting wind data and rain totals from the storm on Monday morning, but meteorologist Sarah Jamison estimated that about an inch of rain fell in York County and an inch and a half in Cumberland County. There were reports of 1-inch hail in Cumberland, she said.

There were no reports of widespread flooding.

Gillian Graham is a general assignment reporter for the Portland Press Herald. A lifelong Mainer and graduate of the University of Southern Maine, she has worked as a journalist since 2005 and joined the...

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