Jul 30, 2009 6:51 pm US/Eastern
Officials Confirm Tornado In Sussex Co. Town
NWS: EF2 Twister With Winds Up To 120 MPH Hit Wantage
WANTAGE, N.J. (CBS) ―
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CBS 2 HD viewer Sandy Behre of Ogdensburg, NJ sent in this photograph of a funnel cloud, believed to be the same funnel cloud spotted in Wantage.
CBS
National Weather Service officials confirmed Thursday morning that a tornado touched down in a Sussex County town during Wednesday afternoon's severe thunderstorms that pushed through the region.
Officials say an EF2 tornado tore through the town of Wantage, ripping roofs of some houses, destroying barns, and causing extensive damage to roadways in its path.
Winds from the twister were estimated as high as 120 mph.
CBS 2 HD captured images of some of the tornado's destruction. Two barns were ripped apart; their walls tossed around like pieces of paper. Then there was the silo that tumbled like it was a toy. The silo was made with about 40 tons of concrete and steel all meshed together. To see it ripped apart by Mother Nature was a marvel.
"Thank God I'm here," said Douglas Ricker, a Wantage farmer who witnessed the storm. "It was banging and banging, you hear all of them reports of how many lightning strikes there was, I mean it was just bang, bang, bang, bang, bang.
It's also a marvel Ricker is still alive. He was riding around his farm inside a tractor when he said the funnel cloud passed right over him.
When asked what it was like under the funnel cloud, Ricker said: "It was very quiet. That's all, just quiet. Everything was above me."
All this happened while pieces of his livelihood passed by his eyes.
"After it went through, it actually went over the top of my head I guess, and I went out and surveyed the damage," Ricker said. "You just can't believe what this wind can do."
The township declared a state of emergency after the extensive damage also done to trees and power lines. No one was hurt by the twister, fortunately.
"With the different people that saw it and sent me pictures of it, there's no question in my mind it was definitely a tornado," Wantage Mayor Parker Spence said.
Now, with the cleanup at Ricker's farm come questions about the near future.
"Hopefully we can continue milking cows until insurance tells us what to do," Jeff Ricker said.
What they're doing first is giving thanks that everyone's still around to talk about the day a tornado came to town.
The mayor of Wantage said the last time a tornado hit the town was September of 1980.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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