By Robert Tomlinson
News Director
THREE RIVERS — The National Weather Service has initially rated the tornado that raced through Three Rivers Friday afternoon at an EF-2.
The assessment came Saturday evening following a survey by NWS surveyors in the Three Rivers area; however, it is based on an assessment of a small portion of the possible track of the storm, and is subject to change as the survey is not fully complete. Further details are anticipated to be released on Sunday as they become available.
According to the preliminary information released by NWS, initial survey efforts focused on the area of M-60 and West Broadway Street where commercial buildings, including the Menards building, were damaged. Wind speeds reportedly peaked at 130 miles per hour, placing it in the EF-2 range on the EF-0 to EF-5 scale based on those initial surveys.
Authorities say there have only been minor injuries and no reported casualties in the Three Rivers area as part of the supercell storm that hit the area Friday night. St. Joseph County declared a local state of emergency Friday night, which Emergency Manager Josh Shook said allows the county to activate its emergency operations plan and use additional resources within the county to handle the incident.
The NWS noted that as they complete their survey, they also hope to pin down whether it was one tornado or several tornadoes that hit the area.
“It is possible our survey team finds a single long track tornado or they find that the tornado cycled (lifted) and that the damage path is not continuous, meaning there were multiple tornadoes in Lower Michigan,” the NWS said in a separate report Saturday morning.
Robert Tomlinson can be reached at 279-7488 or robert@wilcoxnewspapers.com.
