It really was a tornado

It was a tornado after all that hit Minneapolis, but it was a weak enough one that 19 minutes elapsed before the first warning sirens were sounded, the National Weather Service determined Thursday.

The agency said that the tornado uprooted trees and damaged dozens of homes in a small part of south Minneapolis about 1:50 p.m. Wednesday, then traveled 4.5 miles north until a Minneapolis fire official called in a tornado sighting. That prompted Hennepin County to sound sirens, at 2:11 p.m. By then the tornado had damaged the roof of the Convention Center, the steeple at Central Lutheran Church and the roof of the Electric Fetus, a popular music and gift shop.

The Weather Service also determined that a different tornado later crushed the roof of a middle school in North Branch, about 50 miles north of Minneapolis, while doing little other damage in the city. That damage has called into question whether the school will open as scheduled Sept. 8.

The Weather Service gave both tornadoes its lowest strength rating, EF0, noting winds ranging from 70 to 85 miles per hour.

The Minneapolis tornado, one of four in Minnesota confirmed by the Weather Service, emerged out of conditions that were unlikely to produce twisters, one reason the Weather Service had no severe weather warnings in place at the time, said meteorologist Matt Friedlein, who was briefed by the agency's tornado assessment team Thursday.

Although its outside spotters were out, the agency received no reports of tornado sightings between 1:50 p.m. and 2:11 p.m. Low clouds in general at the time and heavy tree cover in south Minneapolis might have combined to limit sightings of the twister, Friedlein added. But as it approached downtown, images of it from Interstate Hwy. 35W soon turned up on the Internet.

The agency also confirmed tornadoes Wednesday in Cottage Grove and Hudson, Wis., as well as in Brown and Blue Earth Counties in south central Minnesota. No injuries were reported in any of the twisters, which brought Minnesota's 2009 total to 18, according to a preliminary count. The Weather Service declared the Cottage Grove tornado a low-end EF1, meaning it carried winds of over 86 mph.

Will school be open?

In North Branch, a decision on when the middle school might open will not likely be made for at least a week -- pending checks for structural damage and possible gas leaks, said Patrick Tepoorten, the school district's community relations coordinator.

Some teachers and staff were in the building when the storms blew through. DeDe Besch, a sixth-grade language arts teacher, had just finished preparing her classroom for the school year when she saw a section of the bleachers rolling across the athletic field. Then the roof caved in.

"My room's done. Er, was done," she said.

With no injuries reported, Danielle Steffen, the mother of a North Branch seventh-grader, said she can live with inconveniences.

"There are concerns about day care, if school doesn't start on time and about when they get out next spring," she said.

"But I think about DeDe. She was my son's teacher last year and she was in the building when the tornado hit. She's safe. They're all safe. That's all that matters."

In Minneapolis, three families were knocked out of their homes at least through Thursday night, according to the Red Cross. But no homes or businesses were considered lost. Three garages had to be demolished, according to city spokesman Matt Liable.

Neighbors began helping one another almost instantly. Ronda Miller made room for neighbor Mabel Patterson, her daughter, granddaughter and grandson, who spent the night because their home's roof was destroyed when an aged elm tree split and fell on it.

"It's stressful," said Patterson, who has lived at Oakland Avenue and E. 47th Street for more than 35 years. "But when I look around I realize we've been blessed. In spite of everything, we've got our lives," she said.

Replanting to begin ASAP

Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board forestry director Ralph Sievert said the dozens of decades-old elms, maples, ash, pines and other trees lost in the storm would be taken to a commercial chipping company.

Workers will begin planting new, young trees right away. The neighborhood will look bare, Sievert said, but "it helps people recover a little bit from such a hard storm," he said.

State Farm Insurance Co. had received about 200 damage claims from south Minneapolis by Thursday afternoon, a spokeswoman said.

The Hennepin County Sheriff's Department issued a statement emphasizing that it sounded sirens in Minneapolis as soon as it got the report of a funnel touchdown.

The Weather Service also will review its performance during Wednesday's storms, as it does after all tornadoes, "even if we think we did a great job," said Friedlein, the meteorologist. It will review radar data, analysis and forecasting procedures, he said, "but I wouldn't expect anything to shift in terms of our operation."

Bill McAuliffe • 612-673-7646 Paul Levy • 612-673-4419