A rare and powerful tornado sent residents of a coastal city in Virginia fleeing for cover over the weekend as it peeled roofs from buildings and pushed homes from their foundations.
It was the most powerful tornado ever to hit Virginia Beach, Virginia, officials confirmed Monday. No one was reported injured, despite few residents being prepared for tornadoes. Several people described taking cover under stairwells; most lack basements because the water table is so high.
Wreckage from destructive weather dotted the U.S. Monday as officials took stock of unrelated tornadoes and flooding damage from over the weekend, stretching from Florida to Maine.
In Virginia Beach, residents credited a cellphone warning system for helping them take shelter in time. One family escaped injuries by reacting to a weather alert that came less than a minute before the tornado hit.
"It just happened suddenly," Lori Camper said. "The whole thing lasted 10 seconds."
She and her visiting daughter looked out the window and saw the trees bending in the wind and ran. The family, including Camper's grandchildren, aged 2 years and 5 weeks, as well as two dogs, ran into a stairwell -- the only place without windows.
"Then all the windows blew out in the kitchen and sucked everything out of the kitchen and a tree fell through the roof," Camper said. "And now one side of the house is leaning."
She hadn't experienced a tornado that strong in the 19 years she had lived there.
"I'm grateful," she said. "God took care of us."
No injuries were reported.
Elsewhere, officials were assessing damage Monday in West Virginia, Maine, Florida and California. The National Weather Service confirmed a Saturday tornado in Florida. And high water on the Mississippi River is testing flood defences in Iowa and Illinois as the river crests in the area Monday.
West Virginia's eastern mountains could see up to 8 inches (20 centimetres) of snow Tuesday morning as a rare May winter storm moves through, forecasters said. The snow won't help the area's ski resorts, which had already closed for the season.
In California, a late-season weather system brought showers and the possibility of high-elevation snow in the Sierra Nevada through the week. Fears of flooding shut down of parts of Yosemite Valley over the weekend. But the National Park Service said the Merced River did not rise as much as expected and the valley reopened on Monday.
In Maine, heavy rain and powerful wind gusts knocked out power for more than 50,000 homes and businesses on Monday morning. Wind gusts of up to 70 mph (115 km/h) were reported Sunday near Matinicus Island, about 20 miles offshore, and up to 65 mph (100 km/h) onshore in Bath, where Navy shipbuilder Bath Iron Works has numerous cranes. Rainfall approaching 5 inches (13 centimetres) also led to flood warnings on several rivers in parts of southern Maine.
The Virginia Beach tornado damaged at least 100 buildings, tearing through them with wind speeds as high as 150 mph (240 km/h), officials assessing the wreckage and weather data said Monday. The National Weather Service's Wakefield, Virginia, office confirmed Monday morning that the tornado was rated at EF-3, with wind estimates of 140 mph (225 km/h) to 150 mph (240 km/h). It's the first tornado to be rated that high, according to NOAA records, with wind gusts exceeding those of the largest hurricanes recorded around the city.
A.T. Price, 73, was at his stove making tacos Sunday when his phone started to buzz with severe weather alerts. At first, he pooh-poohed it.
"But it kept buzzing and buzzing. I checked it again and it says, 'Immediate danger. Tornado down,"' Price said. He dove into the closet below his first-floor stairwell, crouching into a fetal position under his winter coats.
"I heard the freight-train sound, and it sounded like it was going right over the house," Price said. "I would tell people to heed those alerts."
Virginia Beach Director of Emergency Management David Topczynski said Monday that the city got lucky because the storm blew in Sunday during a music festival, where an emergency operation center was already set up, allowing for a swift response.
The tornado caused an estimated $15 million in residential damage, with nine homes destroyed, the city said in a Monday afternoon news release. Another 36 homes sustained major damage that made them unlivable, while "many more" had significant damage, the city said.
The Israeli military targeted a top Hezbollah figure in a strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on Friday, two security sources in Lebanon said, sharply escalating the year-long conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group.
Smoke is rising over Lebanon’s capital of Beirut Friday after Israel’s military struck southern suburbs – a dramatic escalation in a year-long period of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.
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Since she was a young girl growing up in Vancouver, Ginny Lam says her mom Yat Hei Law made it very clear she favoured her son William, because he was her male heir.
The Montreal couple from Mexico and their three children facing deportation have received a temporary residence permit.
Emergency crews in northern Ontario found the bodies of four people inside a home where a fire broke out Thursday night.
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Five bison are dead at Elk Island National Park east of Edmonton following an early Thursday morning collision.
Lawmakers are scrambling to ensure that the U.S. Secret Service has enough money and resources to keep the nation's presidential candidates safe amid repeated threats of violence. It's unclear, though, how much they can do with only weeks before the election, or if additional dollars would make an immediate difference.
The mayor of a French town making headlines for the trial of dozens of men accused of rapes that occurred there over almost a decade has apologized for comments that appeared to downplay the case.
A federal law enforcement agency confirmed it's opened an investigation into Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after he allegedly cut off the head of a dead whale and took it home two decades ago.
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Lawyers representing dozens of women who say they were raped and sexually abused by Mohamed Al Fayed, the former boss of the famous London department store Harrods, said the case was akin to the crimes of sex offenders Jimmy Savile, Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein.
A 20-year-old man and his co-conspirator have been charged with conspiracy to steal and launder over US$230 million in cryptocurrency, and federal authorities said the arrests are connected to an FBI raid of a mansion in Miami.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tapped Treasury Board President Anita Anand to take on additional duties as Canada's minister of transport on Thursday.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh got into a heated exchange in the House of Commons on Thursday, just minutes after Singh announced his party would not be supporting the Conservatives' first non-confidence motion against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government.
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The Israeli military targeted a top Hezbollah figure in a strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on Friday, two security sources in Lebanon said, sharply escalating the year-long conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed group.
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An Ontario man says it is 'unfair' to pay a $1,500 insurance surcharge because his four-year-old SUV is at a higher risk of being stolen.
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Defence counsel for accused murderer John-Christopher Arrizza argues he was in an “altered state of mind†due to days of drug and alcohol use, sleep deprivation and not eating, when he fatally stabbed a man at a Banff nightclub in 2022.
Injury prevention experts are urging Calgarians to ride carefully as e-scooter crashes land hundreds of people in the hospital.
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Driving into the tunnels of Nutrien's Rocanville mine, the largest potash mine in the world by production volume, feels like driving down a lonely highway in the middle of the night.
Emergency crews in northern Ontario found the bodies of four people inside a home where a fire broke out Thursday night.
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An Ontario man says it is 'unfair' to pay a $1,500 insurance surcharge because his four-year-old SUV is at a higher risk of being stolen.
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Two men from Barrie have been charged after a deadly shooting at a park in Keswick on Wednesday.
A growing group of brides and wedding photographers from across the province say they have been taken for tens of thousands of dollars by a Barrie, Ont. wedding photographer.
Ontario Provincial Police executed a search warrant in Walkerton.
On Thursday, just after 9:30 a.m., a man was found and taken to police headquarters, where he was released with conditions and a future court date.
Standing up, speaking out, and showing solidarity — survivors and supporters gathered in the core to take back the night in Windsor. The city is just one of a growing list of communities that have declared intimate partner violence (IPV) an epidemic.
The Windsor Police Service (WPS) has seized over $56,000 in drugs and have arrested one suspect.
In a rare move, the Greater Victoria School District Board of Education has been slapped with a ministerial order from the province requiring it to update a student safety plan – drawing concern around political posturing leading up to an election.
The Union of B.C. Municipalities is asking the provincial government to make transit free for teenagers.
To appreciate why Mimi Vandermolen is so pleased to notice one particular vehicle she’s walking past, you need to know that seeing this many cars in one place would have been unimaginable when she was growing-up in the post-war Netherlands.
A pair of runaway pigs are in the custody of an animal sanctuary in the Okanagan after evading police and volunteers for hours earlier this week.
The Red Bridge, a historic landmark in Kamloops, B.C., was completely destroyed by fire early Thursday morning.
Animal protection officers in British Columbia have rescued three pit bulls – including one that gave birth to 10 puppies – from a rat-infested home in Kelowna.
A Vulcan, Alta., man has been charged with a Lethbridge woman's murder after her body was found in the Oyen area.
A Lethbridge couple got a good reminder as to why you should keep your vehicle doors locked at all times.
Lethbridge residents who live near the police range can expect to hear plenty of shots fired Wednesday and Thursday.
A new community health profile in the Algoma District shows the area is significantly below provincial averages in a number of health metrics.
North Bay Police Service says one person has died following an industrial accident at the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission Rail Yard on Tuesday.
Three northern Ontario residents are charged with drug trafficking after the vehicle they were in got stuck along a bush road off Highway 17 on Monday.
Newfoundland and Labrador's chief medical officer is monitoring the rise of whooping cough infections across the province as cases of the highly contagious disease continue to grow across Canada.
A 16-year-old biennial event aimed at fostering business in the country's eastern Arctic and northern regions has been cancelled indefinitely as a dispute unfolds between Inuit in Canada and a Labrador group claiming to share their heritage.
Jim Lester’s farm hopped on the cow-cuddling trend in early August, and his time slots have been pretty well sold out ever since.
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