Representatives with The National Weather Service were in Tolland County Thursday surveying the damage from Wednesday’s storms. The NWS reports an EF-1 tornado touched down in Andover, continued through Coventry and ended in Mansfield.
“The damage path is put at 11.2 miles long, total, although it is likely the tornado did lift periodically throughout that,” said Matt Doody, a Meteorologist with NWS.
Doody said it touched the ground around 5:19 p.m. in Andover, and ended its destruction around 5:51 p.m. Downed power lines and splintered trees were a common sight across the area with winds upwards of 90 mph.
Doody said the storm that swept through Tolland was a microburst, also known as straight line winds. Winds reached upwards of 80 mph and swept through town for about a mile.
“We knew it was supposed to rain,” said Jeanette Loehr from Tolland. “We didn’t know anything else, I guess it was quite horrendous,” she said.
Loehr said some trees were down around her area and electricity was out for quite some time.
The confirmed tornado makes it the fourth to strike Connecticut this month.
“It’s been extremely hot and humid for almost two weeks straight now and when you get an air mass like that it become unstable,” said Doody.
There were no reported injuries.