Tornado confirmed in Hamilton – first in 18 years

On the afternoon of July 4, a funnel cloud was spotted by many lingering over Hamilton Mountain. While funnel clouds themselves are relatively harmless when spawning from a non-supercell storm they can occasionally make ground contact and become a landspout tornado.

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After receiving accounts and evidence from witnesses, surveyors from the Northern Tornadoes Project (NTP) have confirmed that the funnel cloud did in fact make ground contact and gave the tornado a rating of EF-0, being the weakest rating.

Witnesses reported dust and small debris swirling around underneath the funnel cloud, along with minor damage to a few roofs. Luckily, no major damages were reported. The tornado had a maximum wind speed of 105 km/h and a maximum track width of 20 metres.

The confirmation makes this the first tornado to touch down in Hamilton since 2005, when an F-1 tornado (the EF-scale wasn't adopted in Canada until 2013) ripped the roof off of an elementary school and damaged several homes in a nearby neighbourhood.

This tornado also marks the 8th confirmed tornado in Ontario for 2023. Canada averages around 60 confirmed tornadoes per year and is second in ranking for the number of annual tornadoes in the world.

NTP is an effort made by meteorologists with Western University that aims to study tornado activity in Canada. They conduct ground and aerial surveys, as well as utilize satellite imagery to survey damage, confirm, rank tornadoes.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Robyn Downie/Submitted

With files from Dennis Mersereau