PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – A hot and humid Friday afternoon brought severe storms to the Delaware Valley that lasted well into the night. Storm damage, including overturned cars in Lawrence Township, Mercer County, prompted the National Weather Service to send out a survey team Saturday to assess the damage.
After conducting a storm survey, the National Weather Service Mount Holly confirmed Saturday afternoon that an EF-0 landspout tornado touched down in Lawrence Township, New Jersey, between 5:59 p.m. and 6 p.m. on Friday.
Land spouts can arise from interactions from outflow boundaries, as they can occasionally cause enhanced convergence and vorticity at the surface. There were multiple outflow boundaries in the area on Friday as storms rolled through the region.
The landspout tornado in Mercer County had winds of up to 80 miles per hour and was 200 feet wide, according to the NWS. The system’s path was 0.21 kilometers long and no injuries were reported.
The NWS storm survey showed the landspout tornado downed and broke several trees and flipped about a half-dozen vehicles.
Jaroslaw Radzimiersky
Friday’s severe weather also left a trail of destruction, with numerous reports of hail, flooding and even a waterspout over Barnegat Bay.
