One week after a tornado touched down in Saratoga County, officials continue to put the pieces back together and reckon with future storms.
Last week, the National Weather Service confirmed a tornado touched down in Wilton, bringing with it winds upward of 60 miles per hour.
National Grid reported nearly 500 customers impacted by the storm, though no major injuries were reported.
At an emergency town board meeting Monday, Wilton residents came out to share their concerns with the ongoing clean up.
Some, like local Mike Mandel, were frustrated by an apparent lack of clarity in communication from town officials.
“It’s not a request, it’s a demand; it’s that the town will keep coming by and picking up debris that we rake from our yards into the street. They will keep coming by day after day until it’s gone. This is not a one-time courtesy, this is going to happen over and over and over again,” said Mandel.
Town Supervisor Toni Strum says she understands the frustration but emphasizes the need for patience.
“Unfortunately, we can’t clear up every single area immediately. Because, certainly focusing initially on the larger roads, so there has been some frustration in some of the harder hit neighborhoods. But by yesterday most of the right of way was cleaned up but we’re continuing to go around and the Sears tree company is going to be coming around this Friday as well as next Friday to assist with pick up of things that people are going to bring out,” said Strum.
While a tornado might not be the most expected weather phenomenon in New York's Capital Region, University at Albany Professor of Atmospheric Science Brian Tang wasn’t that shocked.
“There’s about a 25% chance of a tornado in any given year in Saratoga County. That’s just looking at the raw numbers,” said Tang.
He says a few things need to happen for a tornado to occur including high heat and humidity.
“The thing that was perhaps more important for the event that occurred is something we call wind shear. That’s when the winds are changing in directions in heights as you go up in the atmosphere. What that does is it provides spin. A regular thunderstorm can have a really strong updraft, but sometime the updraft is just going straight up. But once you have this windshear that’s when the updraft can start rotating and that’s what can make for a supercell thunderstorm like what we had in Saratoga County and those are the ones that typically produce tornados,” said Tang.
Tang says it’s natural for concerns about climate change to rise after major storms, though he adds it’s unlikely Saratoga County’s tornado rate will meaningfully rise.
“The likely outcome is that we’re not going to see a perceptible difference in tornados in our lifetime even if there is a slight uptick. It may go from a 25% chance in any given year to 26% or 27%,” said Tang.
Tang says the far more likely outcome is worse storms resulting in more damaging flooding.
“There’s bigger things to be worried about. I think with climate change we expect there to be a lot more heavy rain events and flooding and that can be far more impactful and dangerous to residents across the northeast when we do have these thunderstorms producing an inch of rain per hour or whenever we have a landfalling hurricane coming up the coast that can produce excessive amounts of rain as well,” said Tang.
Strum says while town employees and hired tree removal crews continue to work to remove the last of the debris, it’s important for residents to stay in touch.
“The quickest way for us to communicate is through our email list serve and we’re asking people to please sign up for emails. You go to our website, it’s on our home page on the left hand side, sign up for town emails,” said Strum.
