On Wednesday, meteorologists from the National Weather Service in Bismarck surveyed storm damage from Tuesday across Mercer and Burleigh counties.
In Mercer County, the worst damage was at Beulah Bay where two homes had parts of their roofs torn off, large trees were uprooted, there was damage to manufactured homes, and campers were flipped. The evidence there was that very high thunderstorm winds were the cause of the damage. The tree and manufactured home damage suggested winds around 80 mph while the roof damage to the other two homes suggested wind speeds on the order of 95 mph.
Also in Mercer County, at Hazen Bay, trees were uprooted and campers were flipped. Again, this damage was consistent with very high thunderstorm winds, on the order of 80 mph.
Through this area of Mercer County, there was extensive crop damage with the crops in some fields completely flattened, suggesting near 100 percent crop loss.
Finally in Mercer County, a video of what appears to be a funnel cloud was taken from Beulah, looking east-northeast from the city. Based on radar data, the location of this funnel was about four miles west of Stanton, near the intersection of ND200 and ND200A (nearly 15 miles east-northeast from Beulah). The survey revealed no damage in this area, although access was limited due to a lack of roads. Based on this, at this point, it will be recorded as a funnel cloud and not a tornado.
In Burleigh County, a very brief tornado occurred about one-mile south-southwest of Wilton, in an open field. Although this area was surveyed, there was limited access on existing roads. No damage was found and there appeared to be no structures in this area to damage. The tornado, by NWS policy, will be rated EF Unknown, as it hit no surveyable structures.
According to local law enforcement, there were no deaths and no significant injuries.
Source - https://www.kfyrtv.com
