Team checking possible tornado in Cambridge
Posted Aug 25, 2011 02:58:38 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Environment Canada has a survey team checking into a possible tornado touchdown in Cambridge.
A weather agency employee, who lives in Guelph, had planned to take a closer look at Cambridge today after seeing a very strong storm cell on radar last evening. After getting reports of wind gusts approaching 100 km/h in Burlington, teams were deployed.
“(The employee) began the investigation in Cambridge and it appears there is so much tree damage there that we’re sending another team to Burlington to start the investigation from that end,” explains Geoff Coulson, a warning preparedness meteorologist with Environment Canada.
It will take the teams most of the day to determine with any accuracy whether it was, in fact, a tornado that cut the swath of damage between the two cities.
Coulson says the characteristics of that damage will be key indicators.
“Really it’s looking at the way the damage is laid out that’s one of our main indications of whether it was a tornado or a damaging burst of wind,” Coulson says. “Normally, tornadic tracks are long and narrow with the damage somewhat chaotic along the path. Damage done by large bursts of wind tend to be laid out in one direction and much broader.”
A special weather statement from Environment Canada today shows 33 millimetres of rain in one hour with localized flooding in Kitchener and wind gusts of 100 km/h and a funnel cloud in Cambridge.
