A powerful 50 mph gust of wind sent a two-by-four piece of lumber whizzing like an arrow through the air piercing a 63-year-old Brooklyn man in the head as he walked home from shopping today.
The wooden missile struck Lonnie White of Seagate as he crossed Mermaid Avenue around 12:30 p.m.
“It was crazy wind,” he said from Lutheran Hospital where he was treated for a deep gash.
White said at first he thought he had been scalped.
“It just hit me upside the head. I grabbed my head and looked up I thought someone might have thrown something.”
White said he had no idea how badly he was hurt until he got back to his apartment and his neighbor called 9/11 when she saw his shirt and a towel soaked in blood.
“I’m lucky I have a hard head it probably would have fractured my skull otherwise,” he quipped.
A wind advisory is in effect until tomorrow, with winds as high as 60 mph.
Flights arriving into the three airports were delayed more than an hour throughout the day.
Police reported several wind related scaffold collapses.
An apartment building smokestack that had been secured to the ground for repair toppled at 147-06 138th Avenue in Flushing.
Earlier, falling debris and a roof blew off a shed in The Bronx and a scaffold collapsed on Nobel and West Streets in Brooklyn. No injuries were reported in any of the incidents.
About 2200 Con Ed customers in Westchester temporarily lost power from trees falling on power lines.