Thousands of people at the Ponoka Stampede watched with growing alarm Thursday afternoon as a storm that produced a funnel cloud rolled across a gun-metal sky.
Environment Canada issued a tornado warning for Ponoka, Ponoka County, and Maskwacis at 5:18 p.m. MT, but downgraded the threat to a severe thunderstorm warning after 6 p.m. MT.
“We at this point in time have not been able to confirm any reports of a tornado being on the ground,” said Environment Canada meteorologist Brian Proctor. “We’ve seen the same Twitter reports that you have of a possible house being destroyed but we have not been able to confirm that at this point.”
Nasty storm just north of @PonokaStampede @CTVdavidspence @MargeauxMorin #abstorm pic.twitter.com/8mCoP4zEHb
But Sandra Forbes, who lives in Calgary, said her sister’s house on the north side of Ponoka was damaged by the storm.
“It ripped through the back of her house,” Forbes said. “The back of her house, her sun room, her backyard is completely in shambles and so is her neighbour’s roof.”
Forbes said her sister wasn’t home when the storm hit.
So this is happening right now in front of my sisters home in Ponoka #abstorm @weathernetwork @CTVdavidspence pic.twitter.com/dLcdc6xE19
Mike Stretch, president of the stampede, said about 10,000 people were on the grounds when the storm passed by to the north.
“It was fairly vicious looking,” he said. “We took it seriously. We had an evacuation plan in place.”
Stretch said organizers did not have to evacuate the grounds, and the storm passed at about 5:30 p.m. and moved off to the east.
“They said there was a touch down north of town,” he said, “but I can’t confirm that completely.”
Sister just sent this to me from Ponoka. #maskwacis #yegwx pic.twitter.com/2SoE57Gbo2
Environment Canada meteorologists said they were tracking the severe thunderstorm that was possibly producing a tornado.
Proctor said Environment Canada began to see significant rotation around 4:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. with the storm approaching Ponoka from the west.
They began to get Twitter and email reports of possible funnel clouds just before 5 p.m., he said.
Once they saw the storm on Doppler radar, they issued the tornado warning.
Environment Canada will base its confirmation of tornado on images from storm chasers and may send out a storm-damage survey team.