Possible tornado hits Theresa on Saturday

Feb. 26--Tweet

Theresa Fire Chief Mark Savage is convinced that a tornado touched down in the village on Saturday afternoon.

He's seen video taken by a resident that showed a funnel cloud coming down on state Route 411 at about 1:30 p.m. Saturday, leaving trees on the ground, wires down and debris sprawled all over. But the whirling wind didn't cause any major damage.

"You look for a storm like that in August," Chief Salvage said, "Not February."

The resident who took the video, Todd Reed, couldn't be reached on Saturday. Officials with the National Weather Service in Buffalo also were unavailable to confirm the possible tornado.

Intense rain, wind and thunderstorms swept through the north country, toppling trees and power lines and damaging roofs.

The worst of the storms hit Theresa and a stretch along Route 37 in Pamelia, where a large garage was destroyed, the top of a silo came down and a wall at Eiss Bros. Auto Parts ended up mangled.

The wind also blew a single-wide trailer, near Silver Street and Route 46 in Theresa, six feet off its foundation. The damage included blown windows, floors popping up and damaged doors, Chief Savage said. The trailer had to be condemned, rendering a family of four homeless.

About 12:20 p.m., Larry C. Groff, 70, who runs a used-auto sales lot at 24159 Knowlesville Road, Pamelia, was talking to a customer in his office when the burst of wind came through the neighborhood.

The burst was so fierce that he worried his auto shop would come tumbling down, he said. He pushed all of his weight against the office door, fearing that the storm was about to break through it, he said.

"All I saw was black, just dark -- a black cloud," he said.

His wife, Sheila, and grandson were inside the nearby house as the storm blew through the yard, uprooting three large pine trees, destroying a garage where he kept six of his prized show vehicles and moving two car trailers about three feet off an asphalt pad.

"I'm just shook up," he said.

The customer's two daughters were parked nearby, inside their father's car. Somehow, the wind cut through just a sliver of his property and the fallen pine trees missed their car, he said. The daughters escaped its wrath.

But the six vehicles -- including a red 1984 Ford Ranger pickup, a 2008 Mustang Bullet, a 2009 Mustang Shelby, a 2003 Mustang Mach I and a 2002 Thunderbird that are worth about $175,000 combined -- all were damaged. He has insurance but isn't sure how much will be covered, Mr. Groff said.

"They don't even see rain," he said. "They were pristine, all show cars."

Neighbors showed up to help him get the six vehicles out of the mangled mess.

But he said he feels fortunate. His family was spared from the storm and left unharmed. And their house of 40 years also was left undamaged. The entire incident was over in about a minute, he said.

He surmised the storm might have been a microburst, a small downdraft found in thunderstorms, since one went through the Watertown area back in the mid-1990s, he recalled.

About a quarter-mile down the road, Andy Toutant Jr. watched from his basement window to see the wind pick up the top of his barn's silo, twist to the right and then let it drop to the ground.

He immediately called his family to the basement, where he knew they would be safe.

"It was like you see on TV, but you don't think it's going to happen here," he said.

In Theresa, Sherry Peer was home alone when her family's trailer was destroyed. She was unharmed, Chief Savage said.

Volunteers from the North Country Chapter of the American Red Cross provided immediate emergency assistance to her and three family members. The Red Cross provided financial assistance for necessities such as food and clothing to four adults.

In St. Lawrence and Lewis counties, 911 dispatchers said they received reports of uprooted trees, downed power lines and a couple of roads covered over with water but no other damage.

A flood warning remains in effect for today in Jefferson County and flood watches remain in effect for Lewis and St. Lawrence counties.

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