Multiple tornadoes touch down on wild and windy Wednesday in southern Manitoba
Swan Lake First Nation powwow grounds damaged after storm blew in from Saskatchewan
Swan Lake First Nation members are scrambling to repair their powwow grounds after a tornado hit the community in southwestern Manitoba just two weeks before their annual event.
Despite the work ahead, Chief Jason Daniels said with just one home taking serious damage, they're thankful it wasn't worse.
"We're very grateful, thankful, that it didn't hit any populated areas of the community," he said Thursday morning. "A few hundred metres north, I think we would have had some more damages to housing."
A storm that entered Manitoba from Saskatchewan on Wednesday afternoon produced multiple tornadoes, said Dan Fulton, an Environment Canada senior meteorologist.
"There's definitely several — like maybe four separate ones," Fulton said Thursday morning, although it will take a while for the weather agency to confirm the number.
WATCH | Clouds swirl over farm fields in a time-lapse video:
Swan Lake First Nation suffered the most damage, but no injuries have been reported following the tornadoes, he said.
"I think we were pretty lucky in that … these guys mostly stayed in the agricultural areas."
The first tornado warning was issued at 3:30 p.m. for Binscarth, a village near the Saskatchewan border.
Over the course of three hours, the storm tracked southeast for about 300 kilometres, from Binscarth to the Morden-Winkler area, around 100 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg, Fulton said.
Reports of tornadoes were made in the Rapid City and Rivers area, around 220 kilometres west of Winnipeg, and near Baldur, around 160 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg, he said.
There were no reports of tornadoes around Morden-Winkler, but the area did get hit by damaging winds and golf ball-sized hail, he said.
Chief Daniels said the tornado in his community touched down on the west side of Swan Lake First Nation, close to the powwow arbour, which had its aluminum roof lifted off and thrown around.
The roof of one home was also lifted on one side, he said. Plans to repair it are already being made.
"It was a scary day," said Daniels, who was on his way from the First Nation to Winnipeg when the tornado hit, but has gotten reports from council members who were there.
The tornado also passed near Swan Lake's bison pasture, but the animals seemed to take care of themselves and they are all fine.
The First Nation's annual powwow is set for June 28-30, so the community is already starting to work on repairs to the arbour as well as the damaged home, he said.
"It's going to be a bit of a challenge, but I'm very confident the community will come together to get ready for the visitors that will be coming from all over North America to our event," he said.
Storm chaser Jordan Carruthers, who lives in Portage la Prairie, Man., said he saw four tornadoes on Wednesday, including the one that hit Swan Lake.
The first one he saw was a brief twister north of Rivers, followed by two more brief ones east of Rivers.
"We tracked [the storm] all the way down to Swan Lake, where it eventually put down a very large, fully condensed tornado that did end up doing some damage," said Carruthers.
He's been chasing storms for 15 years, but he's never seen four in one day in Canada before.
"This season could be a lot more active just due to all the moisture we have this spring," he said.
The Northern Tornadoes Project at Western University is sending a team to investigate the storm. The Ontario-based project is working to improve extreme weather understanding and prediction, help mitigate the impact on people and look at the possible effects of climate change.
A damage survey team of meteorologists and engineers will try to determine when and where this week's tornadoes happened and try to establish wind speeds based on damage caused, said Connell Miller, a researcher with the project who has a doctorate in wind engineering.
Manitoba has averaged seven tornadoes a year over the past few years, Miller said, but the cluster of tornadoes on Wednesday is "not super unusual" in the Prairies.
"You do at least see it a few times per year, where these tornado outbreaks will occur, across the region," Miller said.
Meteorologist Fulton expects the weather will be calmer for a couple of days, but said stormy weather may return Saturday.
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With files from Meaghan Ketcheson, Heather Wells and Riley Laychuk