Overnight storms tore into Ann Arbor on April 15, damaging Yost Ice Arena and leaving Veterans Memorial Park Ice Arena with major damage after the east wall of the ice area on Jackson Avenue near N Maple Road collapsed.
No injuries were reported, but the damage spread quickly across the city. The Ann Arbor Fire Department said crews had answered more than 75 calls by 5:20 a.m., while public works crews worked through Wednesday to remove fallen trees and clear roadways.
Fire officials said several major streets were blocked and some traffic signals were not working, adding to the disruption as thousands of customers in Ann Arbor woke up without power, according to the DTE outage map. The storm hit Metro Detroit broadly, but in Ann Arbor the damage was concentrated enough to snarl travel, knock out power and hit two of the city’s best-known ice facilities in the same night.
The collapse at Veterans Memorial Park Ice Arena showed how hard the storms struck the area, and the damage to Yost Ice Arena raised the stakes for a city already dealing with blocked roads and widespread outages. The immediate question now is how quickly crews can clear debris and assess repairs after a night that left parts of Ann Arbor dark, blocked and still counting the cost.
