It Was A Tornado!

By Andrew Gorosko

A National Weather Service analysis of damage caused by the intense storm that struck the area on May 16 found that a locally rare tornado skipped across the Newtown landscape.

A cluster of storms that entered the area late that afternoon produced a four-to-five-mile path of damage in the Newtown/Bethel area that averaged about 100 yards in width.

“This area of damage was determined related to winds of a tornadic nature. Based on evaluation of the damage to trees and structures, the tornado is classified as an EF-1 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale,” according to the weather service.

An EF-1 tornado carries winds ranging from 86 to 110 miles per hour. Such storms are capable of severely stripping roofs of their shingles, overturning or badly damaging mobile homes, ripping off structures’ exterior doors, and breaking windows.

The most severe storm on the intensity scale is an EF-5 tornado, which contains winds exceeding 200 mph.

The tornado that struck Newtown and Bethel was generated by a cluster of storms that had earlier hit Redding and Ridgefield, according to the weather service. In those towns, “straight line” winds ranging between 50 and 70 mph produced numerous uprooted trees and snapped tree limbs.

Meteorologist Peter Wichrowski of the National Weather Service (NWS) in Upton, N.Y., said NWS researchers determined that based on damage patterns found after the storm, a tornado had skipped across the landscape alternately touching down onto the ground and then rising back into the clouds. “It’s so localized,” he said.

“This is the time of year that is our severe weather season,” which extends from May through early September, he said.

The severe storm caused widespread damage, cutting power to almost 70 percent of local electric customers. Numerous fallen trees brought down utility lines and blocked dozens of local roads during the evening rush, creating extensive travel delays throughout town.

Town Emergency Management Director Bill Halstead said NWS staffers characterized the storm as a “bouncing tornado” that sporadically would touch down onto the ground and then lift up into the clouds as it traveled through town, causing varying amounts of damage along its course.

Mr Halstead, a lifelong resident, said he does not remember a tornado having hit Newtown in the past.

Mr Halstead said that areas that were especially hard hit by the storm included Rock Ridge Road, Key Rock Road, Drummers Lane, Shepard Hill Road, Boggs Hill Road, Bentagrass Lane, Park Lane, South Main Street, Meadow Woods Lane, Toddy Hill Road, Sugarloaf Road, and Johnny Appleseed Drive. 

Mr Halstead said the severe weather caused trees to fall throughout town.

“We were taxed to the limit,” Mr Halstead said of the demands placed on emergency crews on the day that the storm hit.

But the town was well-prepared for the problems posed by the storm, with the town highway department responding with the tools needed to clear away storm damage, he said.

Connecticut Light & Power Company (CL&P) repair crews spent several days restoring electricity to local customers.

At the height of the outages at about 9 pm on Wednesday, May 16, there were 7,348 local CL&P customers without power. The electric utility has 10,788 local customers.

The electric restoration project was essentially completed by 6 am Saturday, May 19, when only nine CL&P customers were without electric service.

CL&P spokesman Mitch Gross noted that repairing the damage was complicated by the fact that trees continued to fall and bring down electric lines long after the storm had passed. Local volunteer fire companies responded to reports of newly downed electrical lines for several days after the storm.

The rain-saturated soil in the area weakened many trees, resulting in the continuing problem of trees falling, Mr Gross said. The situation made it difficult for electric crews to reach areas where they needed to make repairs, he said.

“What surprised a lot of people was the ferocity of the storm when it hit…It was just a lot of storm damage,” he said.

Mr Gross said that electric repair crews in Newtown replaced 18 damaged utility poles, replaced 305 damaged crossbars atop utility poles, and replaced 130 electrical transformers that are mounted on poles. Crews from Massachusetts and New Hampshire were called in to help with the electrical restoration, he said.

CL&P used Fairfield Hills as a staging area for its repair crews.

Town Public Works Director Fred Hurley said, “When you have something like this [storm occur], you learn if all your response systems work.”

The town’s communications system worked well, he said.

“Every major trouble call we got, we answered,” he said. At the height of the problems, almost 60 local roads were closed due to fallen trees, he said. Also, weakened trees continued falling after the storm, he said.

Local schools were closed on May 17 and May 18 because many electrical lines that had fallen in the storm remained down on the ground, posing public safety hazards, he said.

Besides an initial Code Red message transmitted on the public hazards posed by the storm damage, the town transmitted two additional Code Red messages to residents updating them on the progress being made on storm-related repairs.

The town uses the Code Red emergency notification system to place automated telephone calls to residents to inform them of various emergency situations.

Mr Hurley said he realized that a severe storm was afoot when he stepped outdoors and noticed that the sky had turned a dull green color, an indicator of a tornado in the area. Mr Hurley said he cannot recall another tornado having hit the town.

Perhaps the clearest indication of tornado damage locally was found in the Meadow Woods Lane neighborhood off Toddy Hill Road, where the damage that was done by twisting winds was evident, he said. 

Mr Hurley said the last comparable windstorm to cause such extensive damage locally was Tropical Storm Floyd, which hit the town in 1999.

Mr Hurley said he expects it will take another two weeks for the town to complete storm-related cleanup work.

In view of many residents’ desire to dispose of the brush that fell in the storm, the local open burning season will reopen on May 29. Permits required for open burning are available at the fire marshal’s office at 31 Peck’s Lane, telephone 270-4370.