Wantage hit by tornado

Funnel cloud had winds of 120 mph, By Beth Kalet Wantage — A tornado struck at about 2:45 p.m. on Wednesday, July 29, helping this most un-summery month come to a true summertime close. The funnel cloud first touched down in the Wantage Township in the neighborhood of Route 519 and Rutgers Road, according to Eskil “Skip” Danielson, Sussex County’s Director of Emergency Management. It then continued to hop along, bearing winds of about 120 mph, bouncing over the region’s mountains and touching down several more times before crossing the border into New York, where it petered out. In the process, it knocked down and uprooted trees, pulled a porch from one side of a house to the other and smacked into several roofs on the Ricker Farm, causing considerable damage, but no human being was injured. Danielson said that earlier that afternoon, at about 2 p.m., a tornado warning had been issued for the area by the National Weather Service. Shortly afterward, his office used its new outbound 911 service to reissue the warning. This was only the third time in 30 years that a tornado hit the region, Danielson said. When it first touched down, the tornado “did considerable damage to trees and signs in the area,” Danielson said. A house at the location was “well protected,” and unharmed. A local resident observed the classic funnel cloud and reported it. From that point, “the tornado lifted off and came down again on Route 651 just north of Route 23 and it did considerable damage in that area, knocking down trees and telephone polls.” Once again, it lifted off. “This is not unusual in hilly country for a tornado,” Danielson said. “When you put a tornado in hilly land, it hop skips and jumps because of the convections.” The storm’s next stop brought a great deal more damage than it had done before. “The next time it actually groundfalled was on Beemer Road in Wantage and it stayed on the ground there for seven-tenths of a mile; and then it at the end of that it struck the Ricker Farm, doing damage to house, knocking down a silo and damaging two barns.” That wasn’t the end yet. The tornado “then drifted off again and went another half a mile to an area on Wolfpit Road and there it struck a house, lifting the porch from one side of house, clear over the other side. It lifted a boat and took it a quarter mile away and (did) damage to a vineyard,” Danielson said. It was nearly over by then. The tornado lifted off once more and “made its final landfall in New Jersey at the New York border on Route 651. “When it landed at the New York state line, it knocked down a lot of trees and telephone poles...and it became an EF-0 tornado with winds of about 80 miles an hour, cycling counter- clockwise, the distinctive direction of tornado winds. July 29 tornado facts Winds: 120 mph Distance the tornado traveled: about 7 miles. Longest distance covered while on the ground: about 7/10 of a mile. Of that, about 5/10 of a mile was complete woodland. Average width of the tornado while on the ground: 300 feet wide Type: An EF2 tornado, which means it has winds from 110-135 mph. Source: Eskil (Skip) Danielson, Sussex County Director of Emergency Management; and the National Weather Service