WATCH - Drone footage showing the path of destruction from Leitrim Village Tornado
24 hours on Leitrim Village is still coming to terms and dealing with a freak weather event from a tornado which ripped through the village causing substantial damage.
Roofs and tiles where ripped from building, trees shredded to bits, sheds completely gone and 4 boats over turned and sank.
Parked cars on the main street where also damaged with one man treated for cuts to his face after planks came through his front window of his car on the main street (image below). It really is a miracle that nobody was seriously injured or killed in this freak weather event.
Cause of the Tornado
The Letirm Village tornado formed on the backend outflow ahead of storm Fergus were some very active and strong thunderstorms developed just after 11:30am. This led to Met Eireann to issuing a status Yellow thunderstorms warning for a number of counties in the west of Ireland but did not include Leitrim. This thunderstorm developed over Galway and the tracked over Roscommon before making its way to Leitrim and producing that tornado.
From review of video footage and the path of destruction this tornado was approximately on the ground for a period of 3 minutes.
Ireland receives on average around 10 tornadoes per year but most go unnoticed. The Leitrim Village tornado on Sunday is one of the strongest recorded tornadoes in Irish history to date and could rank on the EF1 or EF2 scale.
Watch the below Drone footage which shows the path of destruction.
The below radar image taken from around 12:45pm confirm rotation in the area and a passing storm.
Local people in the village at the time reported a roaring sound ripping through the village at the time.