Tornado fells trees after touching down in central Alberta on Wednesday

A tornado touched down in central Alberta on Wednesday, cutting a path through a treed area, but apparently sparing the area from any more serious damage.

Environment and Climate Change Canada issued a tornado warning Wednesday afternoon for an area west of Drayton Valley.

Storm chaser Trenten Pentelichuk said he watched the twister touch down near the hamlet of Lodgepole — about 175 kilometres southwest of Edmonton. He’d been in the area all afternoon, waiting to see if the significant storm activity in the forecast would actually create a tornado.

“Around 4 p.m., things kind of started taking off,” he said.

“Lots of the storms kind of went up and then died really fast, and then we noticed the one that did produce the tornado blew up … when we saw it on the radar to when it had the tornado on the ground it was probably 30, 45 minutes.”

Pentelichuk and his storm chasing partner kept following the tornado as it died down, then returned to the spot where it touched down to survey the damage with a drone.

The storm toppled some trees, but Pentelichuk said it seemed to have missed any of the nearby farms.

“It was, I guess, what you’d call an ideal spot for a tornado, where it can’t really do too much structural damage and nobody gets hurt.”

A survey team from the Northern Tornadoes Project, a research group based out of Western University, confirmed Thursday that a tornado occurred in the area.

Project director Dave Sills told CBC News that once the team on site determines a tornado touched down, they use the details of the damage to assess its strength.

“Typically what we look for to determine if it’s a tornado is a long, narrow path,” Sills said.

“From what I understand, it’s mostly tree damage that’s occurred with this event. So they’ll be looking at the number of trees down and over what area, and trying to make an assessment based on that.”

Environment and Climate Change Canada meteorologist Brian Proctor said the tornado came from a “supercell” thunderstorm, which are common in the Prairies, and known to be capable of producing tornadoes.

It looks like the tornado may have been on the ground for nearly 15 minutes, but it might not have sustained contact the entire time, Proctor said.

“We have seen what appears to be tornado debris as it went across a treed area outside of a farmer’s field, and we’re seeing lots of trees laying down in opposite directions, which tends to indicate rotation associated with that.”

This is the fourth probable tornado in Alberta so far this summer, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada— compared to 12 tornadoes next door in Saskatchewan. In early July, that’s already getting close to the yearly average of 14 to 15 that Saskatchewan typically sees all summer.