Tornado reports draw Environment Canada investigators to northern N.B.

Environment Canada investigators are in northern New Brunswick today, taking a closer look at the damage left behind by Thursday's severe thunderstorm and at videos of what could be "tornadic activity."

Claude Ct, a warning preparedness meteorologist in New Brunswick, said Friday morningthere are unconfirmed reports of tornadoes and according to specialists in Ontario, wind gusts may have reached 190 kilometres an hour.

"So this is comparable to hurricane-force winds or also of a ... tornado," he said.

'It lifted everything in the boat'

7 years ago

Duration 0:54

A massive thunderstorm swept through northern New Brunswick Thursday night leaving a trail of damage in its wake.

Marie-Jose Chiasson, the volunteerfire chief in Miscou, was working at the Shippagan Dollar Store when the storm hit on Thursday between 8 and 9 p.m.

"When it hit, let me tell you, it hit quite hard there was hail hitting in the windows and suddenly boom the power went out," Chiasson told Information Morning Moncton.

"You could see the black sky. Itwas like,'Oh gosh, that doesn't look too good.'"

• Huge thunderstorm rips through Acadian Peninsula

At its peak, the storm knocked out electricity to nearly 6,000 homes and businesses, and the strong winds toppled at least 15 power poles in theLamque,ShippaganandCaraquetareas, according to the New Brunswick Emergency Measures Organization.

Record-setting heat contributing factor

CBC meteorologistBrennanAllen said after looking on Thursday eveningat the radar images leading up to the storm, he could seewhat is known as a "bow echo"heading toward the area.

Allen explained this usually indicates an intense thunderstorm with a strong down draft that brings winds from the middle of the atmosphere, 5,000 to 10,000 feet up, directly to the ground.

"If you bring those winds directly to the surface without giving them a chance to really weaken ...you can get very intense wind gusts," Allen said.

"And based onwhat I'm seeing that's likely what happened yesterday across northern New Brunswick."

"At the other end of the spectrum, the water temperaturein the Bay of Chaleur, where the ice just melted ... is between 5 and 8 C," Cote said.

Allen said many people love the heat and humidity, there is a dangerous side to the unusual weather that normally wouldn't be seen until late July.

"When you produce this type of instability at this time of year really mixing that hot and humid air with those really cool ocean temperatures near the Bay ofChaleur you can get these types of thunderstorms."

Widespread damage

The severe thunderstorm activity was caused by what Ct called "super cells," which means there was "some rotation in the big cloud structure."

Heexplained that with tornadoes he would expect to see a very narrow path of destruction, usually 100 metres wideby one to five kilometres in length, however that is not the case according to reports.

"Last night we saw damage over a wide geographical area from Grande-Anseto CaraquettoShippagantoLamque, toMiscouIsland, so it's a large geographical area that was impacted," he said."So this is not a signature of a tornado.

"Nevertheless there could have been some embedded tornadoes."