During the late afternoon and evening of Monday, July 27, a tornado touched down in rural southwestern Manitoba and was tracked by tornado chasers for three continuous hours. This is an extremely long time for a single tornado to remain in contact with the ground. In fact, this is one of the longest continuous tornado touchdowns in North American history.
Along its path, the tornado felled trees and took down power lines and even destroyed one section of asphalt pavement. Fortunately, it missed all towns and farmsteads so that not a single structure was damaged during the entire three hours. Because there was so little damage, the tornado was only given a rating of EF2, indicating wind speeds of up to 135 mph. It is possible the wind was stronger at times but there is no way to know.
