THAT was something....

[Mikey the Flower Guy]

unexpected in our area!!
Around 3:45 pm Wednesday afternoon (yesterday) I was up on the roof clearing out heavy debris from our shop's eavestroughs, between severe rainstorms...it had stopped raining just long enough for me to get out and do this......
The sky suddenly went almost black, there was a little rain, kinda windy, but nothing severe in our area, at ground level, I could hear a funny "WHISTLING" sound coming from somewhere above, or rumbling, at a high pitch, got down off the roof just in time before heavy rain, and lightning struck!!
A few minutes later, around 4:00 pm, a tornado touched down on our east "mountain" ( Hamilton is one of ONLY 3 cities in North America, built on two distinct elevations), ripping the roof off a school, that had just earlier been vacated, ripping and snapping trees right from the ground, flipped and moved cars, RV's, and a couple of boats into neighbouring yards, and driveways, and the tornado tore across Hamilton "Mountain", then followed a path roughly in line with our new Red Hill valley Expressway (just being built), tore across a large residential area in east Hamilton, missed my parent's house, and my sister in laws house, by no more than a block, headed diagnally from east Hamilton, to north east Stoney Creek, where it slammed into an industrial building on Millen Road, destroying a loading bay's outer wall and roof, before heading out into Lake Ontario, and disappearing!
This may NOT be "news" to some folks, that have suffered much more calamity in the last few months, BUT, I DON'T REMEMBER a tornado in Hamilton before...anywhere!!
To make a long story short...when I was up on the roof, and looked up, I said to myself...."that sudden change in cloud formation & colour produces tornados".....

 

[Sher]

Be ever so thankful that you are safe ....sounds like that could have been a really bad day for you! In looking at different weather changes around the country and the globe, seems like someone is trying to tell us something....like clean up our acts and take care of our planet. I am so glad to hear that you and your town are safe ....
Sher

 

[BOSS]

Glad alls well Mikey....

We too had some severe weather yesterday here in Missuagain, and today it's snowing a bit....

 

[Connie]

How great that you and yours are safe!

Boss, snow? It's still in the 80s here! Cooler weather is coming in this weekend, I think.

 

[Luc]

Mikey I am glad you are alright and that we still have a place to go to next week.
But one question, Did the new gust of wind & rain clean out your gutters?

Luc

 

[ROBSWF]

Amazing!! I am also very glad that you & yours are fine!!!

The trends in wheather has been something else these past few years!!

 

[LORRIE]

SO glad you listened to your inner self and got off that roof! Kinda scarry all this natural trauma going on isn't it.

 

[Audra]

Glad to hear you and Sandie are safe!
Audra

 

[AKIKO'S]

Boss, Wish You'd Keep Your Miserable Snow To Yourself!

What are you doing sending it all the way here to central Pa?!?

Mikey, glad you got down off the roof in time! Sure has been strange, my son lost a gazebo and the trampoline he gave to his neices and nephews way down the hill came home and landed in his fish pond! The garden center 3 blocks down the street from us lost the roof off it's loading dock and it blew into the greenhouse and damaged a lot of the framework! The dollar store just down from them lost enough of the roof from the flying debris that the sprinkler system was set off and flooded a lot of merchandise. Don't know if they re-opened this morning yet or not!

 

[theRKF]

Wow - glad to hear all our Flower Chat folks pulled through another one. I guess the gloves are coming off and borders coming down when it comes to weather.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to get comfortable under my desk.

Ryan

 

[Rock]

Mikey,
Glad to hear you're ok!
BUT...Aren't you too dam old to be up on the roof???
Rock and the missus!!!

 

[Victoria]

SO glad you listened to your inner self and got off that roof! Kinda scarry all this natural trauma going on isn't it.

I'm glad you are all fine Mike! It's been an incredibly windy few days. I had to walk my brother's wee dog on Sunday... he needed stickum on his paws and I needed a hard hat... the branches just missed my little head.

As for all the natural trauma... remember the old adage... It's not nice to fool with mother nature. Between the weather and the animals (mad cow, bird flu and the like), nature is biting back.

V

 

[Victoria]

The violent storm that tore part of the roof off a school gym in Hamilton was a rare November tornado, Environment Canada said Thursday.

The assessment was made after a two-member team surveyed damage at the Lawfield Middle School and the surrounding neighbourhood, where they found large dumpsters had been picked up and thrown 20 to 30 metres through the air.

Two students were slightly injured when debris swirled through the gym after the twister touched down at about 4 p.m. Wednesday.

The school seemed to suffer the brunt of the damage, but strong gusts buffeted cars and homes as well.

Witnesses reported seeing shingles fly through the air as the skies darkened. Power was cut, cars were mangled, large trees were ripped from the ground and gas mains ruptured.

The school will remain closed until engineers deem it safe to enter again.

The severe weather season in Ontario traditionally runs from late April to early October, making a tornado this late in the year a rarity, said Environment Canada meteorologist Geoff Coulson. But that doesn't mean they can't happen, he added.

"One of the big ingredients is a supply of warm, moist air," Coulson said. "Another key ingredient is some form of lifting mechanism like a cold front to drive through and make that air rise in a very violent fashion."

Still, it wasn't obvious Wednesday that a tornado was imminent, he added.

"What wasn't fully apparent at the time was whether these storms would be as severe and perhaps produce a tornado."

Coulson said a strong updraft - a measurement of how fast air rises - and favourable wind conditions combine to twist and bend wind gusts into a rapidly rotating column of air, or funnel cloud.

"The funnel doesn't have to be visible all the way to the ground to actually be a tornado in contact with the ground," Coulson said. It's the swirling debris on the ground that's usually the dead giveaway, he added.

"As long as it remains a funnel cloud and it's not in contact with the ground it won't do any damage. As soon as it comes in contact with the ground, either visibly or invisibly, damage can be done."

Environment Canada said there are an average of 80 tornadoes in Canada a year, 14 of them in Ontario. Tornadoes are measured on the Fujita scale, which ranges from F-0 to F-5. Wednesday's tornado was an F-1, with wind speeds of up to 180 kilometres an hour.

The scale is named for T. Theodore Fujita, a tornado research pioneer at the University of Chicago, and was adopted in North America in the mid-1970s.

It's used to categorize wind intensity based on the damage it produces.

Wednesday's twister was only the third one to touch down in Canada later than Nov. 9 since record-keeping began in the early 1900s.

The other two were F-2 tornadoes that touched down in the southwestern Ontario communities of Leamington on Nov. 29, 1919 and Exeter on Dec. 12, 1946. There were no reports of death or serious injuries in either event.

The most powerful tornadoes ever to hit Canada were both Level 4 storms.

Twenty-seven people were killed and hundreds left injured in Edmonton on July 31, 1987, after a monstrous tornado touched down in the city's east end, packing winds between 332 and 418 km/h.

In May 1985, eight people died and 155 were injured after a Scale 4 storm in Barrie, Ont., north of Toronto.

There are key signs to look for that signal a tornado may be approaching, Coulson said.

"If people do see threatening weather approaching, very darkening skies, rumbles of thunder, the wind speed is picking up quite dramatically, their best bet is to get into as solid a shelter as they can - preferably below ground - to give themselves the most protection possible," he said.

"It's unlikely we'll see another one(this year), but being in the weather business, one never says never."

 

[Dazeal]

Glad to hear you are ok Mikey!

Some pics I found for you:

More here: http://www.canada.com/fortstjohn/story.html?id=14d9bd69-11dc-46c1-990d-c8125351d0a6