Auckland Tornado 3/5/11

[Lily]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011 ... tion=world

Tornado tears through Auckland suburbs
Posted 19 minutes ago

A tornado has hit a suburban shopping centre in Auckland, tearing off part of the roof, according to New Zealand media reports.

The New Zealand Herald says police have confirmed injuries in the area and there are reports one person has been killed.

The Herald reports the shopping centre's roof has collapsed, forcing authorities to evacuate the building.

TVNZ says the city's harbour bridge has been closed.

Witnesses have described pieces of sheet metal and roof tiles flying through the air.

More to come.

[Lily]

Youtube footage

[youtube]qBTAIld8efw[/youtube]

[youtube]-xAm03EEnQo[/youtube]

[Lily]

From TVNZ http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/harbour ... nd-4152830

One person reported dead as tornado strikes Auckland

BREAKING NEWS UPDATED 16:09
Published: 3:13PM Tuesday May 03, 2011 Source: ONE News



Police say one person is believed to have died after a tornado ripped through Auckland's suburbs this afternoon.

Details of the fatality have yet to be confirmed though there have been reports of cars being overturned and buildings being "ripped up" in the
Auckland suburb of Albany.

The New Zealand Transport Agency had planned to close the Auckland Harbour Bridge but that plan has since been dropped.

The twister is now veering away from the bridge and is heading towards Mount Roskill.

Police say the Albany MegaCentre was in the path of the tornado which struck earlier this afternoon.

Pictures posted on Twitter showed damage at the old Placemakers building at the Albany Megacentre, adjacent to the new Westfield mall.

Mobile phone footage has shown the twister damaging buildings, while images sent into ONE News show cars left overturned.

See 360 degree view of the damage here.

Lucy Zee said: "Albany mall has been evacuted. Im shaking so bad. Roof collapsed. I thought I was gonna die"

Johndhanna said a number of buildings had been "trashed" and there were iron sheets in the air.

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Other witnesses have spoken of "bits of roofing being ripped up".

[Lily]

Now being reported as two dead according to TVNZ http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/two-dea ... nd-4152830

360 degree panorama of the damage here.

[mad*moo73]

Speechless.

[Lily]

From Weather Watch:

Violent thunderstorm rocks Auckland, tornado danger

Posted by wwadmin on Sat, 15/05/2010 - 12:59
Filed in:Storm
A violent thunderstorm has this afternoon moved across Auckland bringing fork lightning, torrential rain and funnel clouds.

Head weather analyst Philip Duncan says almost 750 lightning strikes have been detected in the past 60 minutes and that strike rate is rapidly increasing.

"The frontal band is moving across Auckland and into Taranaki, Waikato, Coromandel and Bay of Plenty. We believe there is a high risk of cloud to ground lightning strikes and a risk of isolated tornadoes. We advise people to stay indoors until the thunderstorms have passed".

"If you see a tornado the safest thing to do is get into a small room on the opposite side of the house. Keep windows closed and stay away from glass".

In the past thunderstorms have created small tornadoes that have lifted roofs, smashed windows and felled trees in regions such as Auckland, Bay of Plenty, Northland, Waikato and Taranaki.

If you're not a fan of thunderstorms then you might not like what's to come. "This is a big, slow moving low. It took 24 hours longer to reach Auckland so we expect it will take another 24 hours before conditions ease. Bands of heavy showers will be mixed with sunny spells too, which will warm the land and increase the risk for further thunderstorms".

MetService has today issued a severe thunderstorm watch for Taranaki, meaning a warning may be issued this afternoon.

[Rivergirl]

Unbelievable! I didn't realise NZ could be prone to tornados.

[johnno]

There not normally Robyn. 3 people dead now

[Anthony Violi]

Get ready for our spring to be the same...

That is an amazing event, just staggering.

[Jake Smethurst]

I believe the official death toll was actually dropped to 1 person the other day. I'm not sure what the mistakes were that were made.

Otherwise a very interesting system. Nice report here by the NZ Metservice. http://blog.metservice.com/2011/05/alba ... -may-2011/

[Meso]

Good read. Interesting that they saw no real tornadic potential beforehand, it's a lot like the tornadoes we get here which seem to come about in the most unlikely of circumstances (ie: the middle of winter). I really wish I could understand this more. In the US, spring roles around and as sure as night follows day, tornadoes pop up everywhere. Yet here, while we have some intense summer time thunderstorms, they rarely spawn tornadoes. But in the odd winter set up a tornado will drop seemingly out of no where.

Just proves how unpredictable the weather still is.

[Meso]

I didn't read the whole page, it actually goes on to explain a bit about why these events are more common in these parts in the colder months...

A little bit more about tornadoes in New Zealand

Tornadoes in New Zealand are quite different from those that occur in the midwest of the United States primarily in the warm part of the year. In New Zealand, tornado occurrence is primarily related to convection along strong cold fronts – and thus they are largely a “cold season” phenomenon. Some notable recent instances include the Waitara tornado of 15 August 2004, the Greymouth tornado of 10 March 2005 (very likely a cold season event, even though it occurred in March), the New Plymouth tornadoes of 3-4 July 2007 and the Cambridge tornado of 17 October 2008. The Albany tornado of Tuesday 3 May 2011 wasn’t of this type. Of course, for those it affected this is nothing more than academic. It is tragic that there has been a fatality, a number of injuries and considerable property damage. As many have already said, it was a miracle that there was only one death.

[Lily]

Great reading, thanks guys I love how down to earth and casual the Metservice sounds (by their report), no stuffiness, just like chatting to a friend

[crikey]

There is another nasty cyclonic style low pressure cell off the west coast of the north island. Similar to the last one, maybe even a bit more energetic.
A good picture of its energy on this animated B & W satellite pic. Time stamp 5th may 2011 0000 to 1800
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/satpics/australasia_IR.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Looks a little nasty.Don't know where its is forecast to travel