OXBOW — Environment Canada has confirmed a tornado struck southeast Saskatchewan during the latest powerful thunderstorm to blast the region on June 9.
Kyle McAuley, a meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada, confirmed to SaskToday the tornado was southwest of Oxbow.
“We had a few storm chasers on it that had great video feeds and pictures, and they were calling in and were very helpful to report what was happening,” said McAuley.
He added one of the storm chasers claimed one tornado dissipated and another formed a short time later, so it might have been multiple twisters in the area.
“That will be investigated in the next couple of days to confirm for sure,” McAuley said.
He has also seen footage on X of structures that were “damaged pretty badly” or “destroyed completely”. McAuley hopes to get more reports to have a better idea of the extent of the damage, he said.
In its daily summary, Environment Canada said a tornado was reported in the North Portal/Oxbow/Alameda area, and there have been reports of damage.
Elsewhere in the province, McAuley said golf ball-sized hail and localized flooding were reported in Regina. A funnel cloud was reported near Southey.
The strongest wind gusts of 85 kilometres per hour were reported around Estevan and Yorkton, he said, while Weyburn and Indian Head received about 30 millimetres of rain.
On the Manitoba side, McAuley said some areas previously drenched by storms received even more rain, including Swan River, which had around 10-15 millimetres on top of 140 millimetres earlier. Accumulations were higher further south, with Stonewall, just outside of Winnipeg, receiving 252 millimetres, or about 10 inches of rain, in one night.
“That is causing a lot of flooding issues. Basements were flooding and yards were being flooded. We’ve seen photos of that," said McAuley.
Tornado warnings were issued in Winnipeg and other areas, he said. Environment Canada has received reports of twisters in Manitoba.
“There was lots of strong rotation that looked like it could have been producing a tornado on the radar,” said McAuley.
The tornado reports for Manitoba came in after dark and were in sparsely-populated areas, he said.
