A rare tornado ravaged Cape Cod Tuesday, tearing the roof off a hotel and causing widespread destruction in the popular Massachusetts vacation town, the National Weather Service confirmed.
The twister touched down in South Yarmouth just after noon, bringing damaging wind gusts of 90mph which brought down power lines, uprooted trees, flooded streets and left 50,000 people without power.
Winds peeled the roof off the Cape Sands Inn in West Yarmouth while major roads were blocked by downed trees and power lines — prompting cops to warn travel in the region was “very dangerous and not advised.”
No fatalities or significant injuries have been reported, cops said.
Burlington man Chris Mason, who was vacationing in the seaside town when the tornado hit, said the twister sounded like “a freight train.”
“All of a sudden the roof on the Cape Sands Inn next door came flying off,” Mason told the Boston Herald.
“The neighborhood’s destroyed, there are trees everywhere, fences are gone,” he said. “The initial hit in the beginning was insane, I’ll never forget it.”
A tornado warning was issued on Monday night for the eastern part of the Cape including the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, where a wind gust of 69 mph was recorded around 11 a.m. Tuesday.
As of 4 p.m., more than 52,000 people across Massachusetts remained without power, according to the Boston National Weather Service.
Emergency crews responded to hundreds of calls for help while Massachusetts State Police deployed extra patrols and K9 teams to help with the storm response and conduct well-being checks.
Of the average 1,253 tornadoes in the United States each year, Massachusetts sees only one, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The American Red Cross has also sent volunteers to the Cape Cod region and a National Weather Service team will meet with emergency management officials to assess the damage.
