Trees completely snapped off and flattened Near Burkhardt in St Croix County. Once Again, a Big Thanks to Dirk for taking me along to see the storm damage.

Parts of St Croix County spent Saturday cleaning up after a Severe Storm which produced a tornado in the Burkhardt-Hammond area Yesterday Evening. First I will talk about how it formed. This storm started forming just west of Minneapolis, Where this storm reported a tornado in the western Suburbs. The storm continued east, and Effected all of St Croix County, and Southern Polk County, The storm produced a tornado in St Croix County and caused severe damage in areas north of Hudson, and the Burkhardt and Boardman areas. The Damage in the Burkhardt–Boardman area was confirmed to have been caused by an high end of a EF 1 Tornado with winds of 100mph.

Another quick message. Early Saturday Morning There was a Severe storm which caused wind damage to parts of Polk County near Osceola, before quickly fading out east of Clear Lake and Clayton. Trees were reported down across a highway in East Farmington Township.

Burkhardt Area EF-1 Tornado Damage

Parts of a Cottonwood tree snapped off 2 miles north of Burkhardt. you can tell this tree was hit by strong winds, This tree would have been on the edge of where the tornado went.

This morning I got a message from Dirk, He asked me if I wanted to go with him to Look at the damage in St Croix County, and I jumped at the opportunity. The damage we saw was mainly isolated to areas north of the Burkhardt area, It was so isolated that we drove down one block with no damage at all then suddenly we ran into, severe tree damage, The damage was 2 miles north of Burkhardt in St Joseph Township, The damage was caused by an EF1 Tornado. The good news is the Tornado did missed the community of Burkhardt. But once you got north of the community, you can see Severe tree and crop damage, Corn was completely flat, and Many trees snapped, and ripped apart, We also ran into some damaged homes. One home had singles missing and the garage doors were completely blown out with some Siding missing, Installation and plastic were blown across the yard into the field behind the home. There were also trees and tree branches thrown across yards

Corn completely flattened near Burkhardt. This photo was snapped right where the tornado went though.

Noticed how it’s bent in two different directions, I’m sure it happened in a quick time period, but, This must mean that the wind first blew in one direction then stitched directions and blew very hard, This damage was confirmed to be caused by a Tornado

The corn was bent in different directions, and there was some odd things we saw that made us believe it was a possible tornado. which has now been confirmed that it was. I noticed that there were tree branches of a certain kind blown across the opposite side of the road, where there wasn’t no trees nearby. The branches must have been blown against the wind in the opposite direction of the storm for that too happen. I even found a small cotton wood tree branch in the middle of an open field. and Dirk and I noticed the Tree damage pointing in different directions, Some trees fell east to west, some more northeast, and some pointed southeast Which signified to us that it was a Tornado

Clayton/Polk County isolated Outflow wind damage

Isolated Tree snapped by strong outflow winds in the storm near my house in Clayton,WI Story Below.

The weaker northern edge of the Severe Storm effect my local area, and Southern Polk County This storm produce strong outflow push of winds across southern Polk County, Which was strong enough to produce isolated spotty tree damage across this area, as well as my local area. Here at my house, I remember strong winds gusts from the south-southeast, The storm started out with no wind then we got short strong gusts, Especially as the back edge of the storm. There was also a lot of cloud to cloud lightning which was very Bright and frequent The lightning never slowed, and Thunder continued for over and hour long.

Read Here About the isolated tree down tree down near my house.

My house we also experienced the gusty outflow wind gusts. I did noticed scattered small branches around our yard from the storm, but I mainly thought hardly anything of it, but when I found a 8 inch diameter tree down not too far from my yard, days later, literally, just north and west of my house. I could not believe it, because The storm didn’t seem strong enough to take trees down. My friend also reported/found isolated trees down north of Clayton. The only thing I can think of is my house was protected from the strongest winds by a thick woods south-southeast of my house, Which was the direction of the strongest winds. My wind gauge reported a gust of just 29MPH from this storm. But it must have been much stronger in isolated areas, The wind did sound pretty strong out there, I would really like to know how strong they were where that the tree was downed, Which is in a viewable distance from our yard. This is not the only tree I found down in the area, I also saw a large tree arm down from a tree down by Clear Lake. The tree I found was healthy so, My best guess is that there were isolated areas where winds gusted to at least 45- to 50MPH.

NWS Storm Damage reports from all of Saturday including the morning storms.

St Croix County: Penny Sized Hail 5 Miles North of New Richmond

St Croix County: Nickel Sized Hail Cylon area “hailed for about 5 minutes”

Polk County: 4 Miles E of East Farminton

St Croix County: Confirmed Tornado- Burkhardt area “numerous power lines and tree toppled, Garage ripped apart”

St Croix County Confirmed Tornado- 2 Miles NW of Hammond, “garage doors blown in, corn blown down”

Personal Report. Polk County: half mile SSE Clayton,WI 8 inch diameter tree downed, Also isolated spotty tree damage around Clayton.

For more photos and story, please Visit Dirks Forecasting Center