On Thursday afternoon a tornado ripped through Hazel Dell and Fruit Valley, near Vancouver, Wash, damaging the WSU Research Station located there.
No one was injured.
Five buildings at the station have major roof damage and two greenhouses were destroyed, said Blair Wolfley, manager of the Vancouver unit. The storm also broke windows out of the five cars in the parking lot.
Two carports in the mobile home park next door blew away and one landed next to one of the research station buildings.
The top 20 feet of a 60-feet cedar tree broke off and fell onto a pickup in the parking lot, Wolfley said.
“It’s a mess. There’s debris everywhere,” he said. But he added his praise of a work crew from nearby WSU Vancouver that was on site Friday morning to help with cleanup.
According to a local meteorologist, the tornado formed when warm air rising from the surface met cold air falling, classic tornado conditions.
For more information on damage to the area, visit http://www.columbian.com/news/localNews/2008/01/01102008_Tornado-causes-damage-in-Fruit-Valley-Hazel-Dell-Orchards.cfm?emilStry=1.
