Did tornado touch down in Richmond? Question remains despite video

A video posted to YouTube Tuesday shows what could be the first tornado to land in the Lower Mainland in more than 50 years.

In the minute-long video, a tunnel of dust is seen reaching from the ground up to the clear blue skies. The slender swirl of wind is seen in the middle of a field surrounded by trees, adjacent to Tim Marsh?s job site at No. 7 Road and Blundell in East Richmond, reported the Richmond Review.

Marsh filmed the clip on his phone from the roof of a warehouse and posted it the next day.

?I turned around and I saw this big stream going up in the sky . . . It?s something you don?t see every day, or ever,? he told the Review of the phenomenon he witnessed Monday around noon. ?Usually you see little dust tornados, wrappers flying in circles and then it dissipates but nothing of this magnitude. I was kind of in awe of the whole thing.?

Another witnesses said the occurrence lasted about 10 or 15 minutes.

A Wikipedia entry notes the last tornado recorded in the Lower Mainland was on July 1, 1962, only the third since the weather office opened in the 1920s. Another tornado had been recorded earlier that year on March 7, leaving the town of Ucluelet with significant damage.

Experts who spoke to the Review were at first skeptical of the video?s authenticity. Questions still remain over whether the video depicts a tornado or a dust devil, which is more common. The difference boils down to speed of wind, according to University of B.C.?s earth and ocean sciences professor Philip Austin.

?It?s pretty spectacular that it?s got that much vertical coherence and that it?s able to keep its identity at that depth,? he noted.

? Copyright (c) The Province

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