The southeast saw quite a storm last night, as Environment Canada has confirmed that four tornadoes touched down in southeast communities. Tornado watches and warnings were put out well in advance, with those tracking through smaller areas in the southeast.
Eric Dykes, a meteorologist with Environment Canada, talks about what they saw forming in the southeast before they sent their initial warning out.
"So what we saw was obviously very high reflectivities on radar. We saw the quintessential-looking hook echo, as we call it, on radar, which indicates that there's going to be some strong rotation within the storm. And Doppler radar was indicating that there was a lot of spin with the storm as well."
By their count, they tracked a tornado near Hirsch, a tornado near North Portal, a tornado near Oxbow, and a tornado near Frobisher. Radar estimations put precipitation in the area during that storm around 20-40 millimetres.
Those all came by during the late afternoon when the storm was east of Estevan.
"Thereafter, we found out that, yes, indeed, there were tornadoes that were reported to us after the warnings came out. The first one being at local time around 4.20 in the afternoon. That's the one that we're saying was near Hirsch. Then, from the same thunderstorm cell, the tornado went back up, moved a little bit over towards the east, if you will, near Frobisher, and then proceeded to quickly drop three successive tornadoes in a row. One at 4:40, one at 4:45, and one at 4:49, all near the Frobisher area."
The storm brought down more than just tornadoes, with plenty of rain and some hail, reported to be golf-ball-sized in some areas, coming down.
Four more tornadoes are currently undergoing an Environment Canada Investigation to see if those are confirmed as having touched down southeast of Regina.