The Thunder Bay International Airport parking lot was a mass of twisted metal on Wednesday night, after high winds tore a portion of the corrugated roof off the 17-year-old terminal.
No one was hurt in the incident, which followed a huge storm surge that swept the city, downing power lines and trees and left up to 6,000 without power, sent torrents of water rushing down streets and forced drivers to the side of the road to wait out Mother Nature’s wrath.
Tbnewswatch.com could not confirm whether or not it was a tornado that touched down, though at least two outside sources claimed they saw a funnel cloud roaring through the city.
Insp. Lorne Clifford of the Thunder Bay Police Service said the airport will remain closed “for some time,” though he couldn’t be any more specific about when it might reopen.
Scheduled flights were still landing Wednesday night, with passengers being ushered out through side entrances as clean-up crews began the task of picking up after the incident.
“Just before nine o’clock this evening high winds took the roof off the Thunder Bay International Airport. It blew across the parking lot, damaged some 18 vehicles. At this point in time our principle concern is to make sure that there are no further weather incidents and everyone gets home safely,” Clifford said, the night sky beginning to settle in over the battered facility.
“We’ve got two more flights coming in. We had one just land just now and we want to get these folks out of the airport area safely. And when the next two flights are in, it’s important to get them off the flight safely.”
The message Clifford wanted to deliver to the public was the lack of injuries.
“There was some minor property damage. When you look at the vehicles, all things being equal, it’s been pretty fortunate. The down side is we may have the airport shut down for a while,” he said.
One woman, who was inside the airport when the roof buckled and flew off, said it was “crazy.”
“It’s just lucky it happened when it did and there wasn’t a flight in,” said the woman, who declined to be interviewed and did not want to give her name.
Hamilton’s Francois Moens, who arrived shortly on a Porter Airlines flight shortly after the damage occurred, called it an interesting flight and gave kudos to the plane’s captain, who managed to skirt the storm and land safely on the tarmac.
Passengers disembarked at the south side of the facility, and were hastily brought through the airport after collecting their baggage.
Moens said they were kept on the plane a few minutes longer than normal, but everything went smoothly after that. He was surprised, however, when he saw what awaited him in the main parking lot – though luckily for him he was picking up a rental.
“They warned us to be careful as we were going into the building and (to) avoid all the damage,” Moens said.
“We didn’t see (damage) downstairs, but around the building it’s quite messy. A few people were quite upset looking outside. They expected their car to be underneath the mess.”
Moens tried to take a lighthearted look at the incident.
“It’s all in the adventure of travel, isn’t it?”
Estimates of the damage are not yet known. Calls to the Thunder Bay International Airports Authority were not immediately returned on Wednesday night.
