They appeared like giants on the horizon, sucking up lake water and spewing it out at up to 90 km/h.
Weather gurus don’t expect the handful of funnel clouds that appeared over Lake Erie – thrilling some boaters and alarming others — to return in the next few days, but you just never can tell.
“They are harder to forecast sometimes because these things happen on the spur of the moment, unlike a cold front or a pop-up thunder storm where you can see tornadoes are possible when the right conditions take place,” said Tony Annyschyn, an official observer for the Weather Network. “These water spouts occur, to me they’re like hit and miss.”
Local boaters found themselves fascinated but unnerved when they witnessed multiple waterspouts — funnel clouds over water — forming off the shores of Colchester on Thursday morning.
“The darn things started forming one after another,” marveled Windsor resident Terry Bachmeier, 65.
Bachmeier was out on the water with a friend in a 16-foot aluminum fishing boat when they spotted the extreme weather phenomenon about 7 a.m.
“At one point, there were eight of these fingers sucking water up,” Bachmeier said. “We thought: ‘If we’re smart, let’s get outta here.’”
Marine forecasters with Environment Canada’s weather office noticed telltale patterns over western Lake Erie on Wednesday evening, prompting a waterspout watch that continued until about noon Thursday.
According to radar observations, the waterspouts spawned from a storm cell hunkered southeast from the Colchester shoreline, towards Pelee Island.
Waterspouts forming over Lake Erie near Colchester. Photo by Landis Marotte of Amherstburg.
Warning preparedness meteorologist Geoff Coulson said the type of waterspout that was on display occurs when the water temperature is very warm relative to the air temperatures above.
“It’s basically a tornado that occurs over water,” he said.
Annyschyn said waterspouts tend to be less dangerous than tornadoes on land, mainly because there is usually nothing to destroy on open water.
“Waterspouts generally are not that dangerous compared to tornadoes,” he said. “They’re beautiful to look at, you know, from a distance. They’re not as dangerous as a tornado on land. They can do a little trouble if you’re a boater out on an open lake and you get caught in it.”
Coulson agreed waterspouts should be given a wide berth by most boats. The “spray ring” — the part of the funnel cloud in contact with the water’s surface — can have wind speeds in the range of 80 to 90 km/h.
Waterspouts forming over Lake Erie near Colchester. Photo by Landis Marotte of Amherstburg.
However, Coulson noted that waterspouts tend to be highly localized and it’s usually easy to avoid them. “If you can see one of these things, they don’t tend to move around very quickly. They sort of meander a bit.”
Coulson added that waterspouts typically dissipate as soon as they reach shore: The vortex depends on warm air rising from the water below. “Once they encounter the rougher terrain and the cooler surfaces of the land, they tend to break apart,” he said.
Leamington saw some shower activity Thursday, but by mid-day, the weather situation over the lake had stabilized and the waterspout watch was lifted.
Earlier that morning, 20-year-old Landis Marotte of Amherstburg set out with members of her family in a 32-foot Sea Ray, looking forward to a relaxing day of perch fishing.
But then the skies darkened and the show began. Marotte said she counted about nine waterspouts in all, with some of them weaving and blending into each other.
“We saw five at first, in the distance. Then we looked over and saw a couple more forming,” Marotte said. “We figured we’d just keep going out to where we were going. And as we got closer to our destination, we saw two more waterspouts.”
Marotte — who had never witnessed waterspouts before — was quick to take pictures from the deck of her father’s boat. “To be honest with you, it was pretty calm,” she said. “If my dad’s brave enough to be out here, then I’m not worried.”
An image by the Weather Network showing areas at risk of waterspouts forming on the morning of July 10, 2014. (Handout / The Windsor Star)
Waterspouts forming over Lake Erie near Colchester, July 10, 2014. Photos by Donna Laur of Kingsville.
Waterspouts forming over Lake Erie near Colchester, July 10, 2014. Photo by Donna Laur of Kingsville.
