Environment Canada has confirmed a tornado touched down in Thornbury, Ont., during Friday’s storm through Western University’s Northern Tornadoes Project.
The tornado followed a path through the town before it entered into Georgian Bay. According to a weather summary issued by Environment Canada, the tornado damaged a tree, a power pole and a street lamp,
“The tornado has been given a preliminary rating of EF0 on the Enhanced Fujita scale with estimated maximum wind speeds up to 130 kilometres per hour a path length of three kilometres,” the summary reads.
“This tornado accompanies several severe thunderstorms, which affected areas near and east of Georgian Bay on Friday afternoon with numerous reports of large hail up to the size of tennis balls and strong winds.”
On Friday, several regions in Central Ontario were under tornado warnings before they ended and became severe thunderstorm warnings.
At this point, Environment Canada has only confirmed that there was one tornado in the region — the one that hit Thornbury.
“It was obviously quite unstable,” Peter Kimbell, Environment Canada’s warning preparedness meteorologist, said of the storm.
“There was a squall line that came through with a number of smaller thunderstorms ahead of it.”