A day after severe weather pushed through the D.C. area, the National Weather Service has surveyed the damage and concluded that there were two tornadoes Thursday in Maryland.
The weather service confirmed Thursday that a tornado touched down in Howard County, and it announced Friday that it was an EF-1 tornado. NWS confirmed an EF-0 tornado in Frederick County on Friday, as well.
The Howard County twister touched down near Glenelg, with estimated peak winds of 100 mph. A tornado with an EF-1 intensity on the enhanced Fujita scale has winds of 86 to 110 mph.
It was on the ground for around seven minutes and carved up a path of around 4.5 miles.
At one point, the weather service said the maximum width was 100 yards. In all, it snapped trees and caused “significant roof damage,” including to a county maintenance facility.
Thursday’s storms also caused power outages. As of 6:40 p.m. Friday, over 200 customers were still without power in Howard county.
It’s the second time in a week that Howard County has had a tornado.
A week earlier, an EF-1 twister damaged homes and uprooted trees. But while that tornado in Columbia injured one, yesterday’s didn’t hurt anyone.
Jim Lee of the National Weather Service said the damage from Thursday’s was concentrated, but wasn’t as big as last week’s.
“The path length of the one in Columbia last week was slightly longer — 5.5 miles — and the width was about 50% larger at 150 yards,” he said.
The Frederick County tornado touched down in the Ijamsville area between 2:48 to 2:59 p.m. on Thursday, and it had an estimated wind speed of 85 mph.
Brandon Fling, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said that similar damage in Spotsylvania county was most likely not caused by a tornado.
“It was most likely caused by straight line winds,” Fling said. “There were a number of trees that were uprooted. The winds were estimated at 70 to 85 mph, as the storms rolled through the area.”
by Jack Pointer (2019, May 31) WTOP
