Cleanup underway after tornado hits Mattapoisett Tuesday

MATTAPOISETT — "Scariest white-knuckle drive of my life," is how Dennis McIntyre describes the ride to his job in Dartmouth after he left his Mattapoisett home around 11 a.m. Tuesday.

If he'd left 20 minutes later, it would have been even scarier.

"This was on 195 westbound. I have never been in rain like that before," McIntyre said.

On Tuesday, at 11:20 a.m. according to the National Weather Service, a tornado materialized in the northern section of Mattapoisett near the intersection of Acushnet and Hereford Hill roads. Though it was relatively short-lived at about three minutes, it was enough to close roads, down countless trees and limbs, and do damage to the town's water treatment facility on Tinkham Lane.

"We have some drone footage, and it looks like the tornado almost went right above our treatment facility and ripped an HVAC unit off the roof," said Mattapoisett Town Administrator Michael Lorenco on Wednesday.

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Lorenco said he was at Town Hall a few miles away at the time of the tornado. While he noticed the text alerts from the NWS with tornado warnings on his cellphone, it didn't become apparent one had actually formed until he was called out of the office to where a tree had fallen on a Highway Department truck.

"There was buckets of rain, it was dark but I wasn't aware [of the tornado] until our highway surveyor called and said a vehicle got damaged," Lorenco said. While enroute, he said "it didn't take very long to realize a bigger incident had occurred."

Then, later into the afternoon Tuesday, NWS confirmed a tornado had in fact occurred in Mattapoisett.

Tornado left hundreds without power

According to Eversource spokesperson Chris McKinnon, about 400 customers in the area where the tornado struck experienced electrical outages Tuesday, but for the most part, were put back on the grid throughout the night.

"There were a few homes that will require a private electrician to make repairs before they can get turned back on," McKinnon said.

As far as downed power lines, McKinnon said it's hard to put a count on exactly how many fell, but Lorenco said from his observation that just about all the lines running along the seven to eight roads affected by the tornado went down.

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Mindful travels

By Wednesday afternoon, much of the rubble had been cleared, making streets passable to motorists again.

"At 8 p.m. it was like it never happened," McIntyre said of his ride back into Mattapoisett after work.

Lorenco thanked the town's first responders and Highway Department, as well as state forestry service and Eversource for clearing the roads quickly. However, as of Wednesday there were still some spots drivers should avoid for now if possible.

"We'd appreciate if people stayed away from Hereford Hill [Road] for now. There's still some downed power lines and obviously residents are trying to clean up," he said. "Also Tinkham Lane — that's the main entrance to the water/sewer department. They're going to be working to clean up there."

Lorenco said North Street and Acushnet Road were passable but drivers should be aware that both had been reduced to one lane for the time being. McIntyre said as of Wednesday afternoon there were still downed lines at the end of Eldorado Drive.

The work ahead

McIntyre, who lives close to where the tornado ceased, said his home was spared any damage despite its force being enough to down two large trees and "at least" two utility poles nearby.

"My neighbors were less fortunate," he said.

While Lorenco noted some damage to private homes, to his knowledge, no residents were left without a place to stay, he said, and as such, there has been no call for the town to activate its emergency shelter.

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"It's honestly a blessing there wasn't more serious damage to homes," Lorenco said, noting the section of town the tornado struck is relatively less populated than other parts, consisting primarily of spread-out private properties and forest. "I consider us very lucky."

Meanwhile, Lorenco said the water treatment plant was back on the power grid as of Wednesday morning after switching to a generator following the tornado. However, damage at the plant, which provides water for Mattapoisett, Marion, Fairhaven and parts of New Bedford, had yet to be fully assessed.

"We'll have to patch the hole in the roof, an oxygen tank got damaged, a generator switch got damaged," he said. "Everything is working but we have to do a full assessment on that building to see what else might have been damaged."

Besides that, Lorenco said residents can expect the work of clearing debris to continue into early next week.

Will there be more tornadoes?

According to National Weather Service meteorologists from the Norton station, a trough in the upper atmosphere was the root of Tuesday's tornado, but it has since moved eastward out to sea.

"These troughs, think of them as little ripples in the jet stream," said NWS meteorologist Andy Nash. "That ripple is pushed off and over the Atlantic now...."

But Tuesday's tornado was not southeastern Massachusetts' first of the season, and it wasn't the last. In late July, an EF0-rated tornado was recorded in Foxboro; and about a half hour after the one in Mattapoisett, there was another on Cape Cod in the area of Marstons Mills.

NWS meteorologist Kristie Smith said Massachusetts averages about two tornadoes a year, mostly what she calls "weak spin-up tornadoes" like Tuesday's.

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"Yesterday it was almost a tropical air mass. We had dew points in the mid-70s, super muggy, and there was a lot of spin in the atmosphere that was able to get that going," Smith said.

According to Smith, southeastern Massachusetts' warmth and humidity makes it more fertile grounds for "spin-up" tornadoes than further inland.

While Tuesday's tornadoes had a relatively low ratings of EF1 and EF0 on a scale of zero to five, larger "supercell" tornadoes do occur in Massachusetts about every 15 to 20 years, Smith said, recalling the June 1, 2011, EF3 tornado in Springfield.

This article originally appeared on Standard-Times: Residents, town officials assessing damage after Mattapoisett tornado