Downed trees cut off access to park buildings and roads.
(Ethan Sandweiss, WFIU/WTIU News)
National Weather Service investigators say two tornadoes are to blame for the destruction across central Indiana over the weekend.
The NWS office in Indianapolis released new information late Sunday based on field visits to areas that sustained damage in the storm. The team previously confirmed that an EF-2 tornado touched down south of Bloomington during the storm.
“We determined they were two separate tornadoes, and the Green County tornado was also an EF-2,” meteorologist Mike Ryan said.
He said that after investigators visited the area and analyzed the damage, it’s clear a tornado was on the ground in the area where local officials say a woman died Friday after a tree collapsed onto her car. Three children were also injured.
“We determined after talking with officials down there that the fatality and the injuries did occur as the tornado touched down in the far western part of the county,” Ryan said.
Local authorities said they received reports of a car with a tree on top of it in the town of Linton at 7 p.m. Friday, just after the storm swept through.
"Upon arrival on scene, the driver was pronounced deceased. Three juvenile passengers were involved, leaving one in critical condition,” according to a statement from the Green County Sheriff’s Office that a dispatcher read over the phone.
Funnel cloud moving through southern Monroe County Friday night. (Courtesy, Pam Thrash)
The dispatcher said the sheriff’s office is still investigating the incident.
The National Weather Service previously confirmed that an EF-2 tornado tore through Monroe County the same night. It caused three injuries, damage to dozens of homes, and leveled a post office in Clear Creek, county officials said.
The same tornado remained on the ground for 35 miles traveling east. It ripped through a campground that’s equipped to accommodate horses.
Flying debris killed one horse and injured another, according to Carl Lindell, a regional manager for the Department of National Resources.
" We did have a horse fatality, unfortunately. We had another horse injured. And three people with non-life-threatening injuries,” Lindell said Saturday during a visit to the disaster area. “It happened right during the storm event.”
Most of the trees on the campground appeared to be on the ground Saturday. Signs, tying posts and picnic tables were shredded through the area. A building housing a restroom for the campsite was covered by fallen trees.
A large mobile home was still overturned Saturday afternoon, and personal belongings including clothing and papers were littered nearby.
Lindell said that rescue crews worked past midnight to carve a path through the debris large enough for horse trailers and RVs to depart.
In Monroe Court, around 75 homes in the Clear Creek area south of Bloomington sustained damage. The Clear Creek post office was leveled, and the Ranchero Motel and an apartment complex were also damaged in that area.
The storms killed least two-dozen people in the U.S., including 18 in Kentucky, where another 10 were hospitalized in critical condition.
A 96-year-old man was taken to IU Health Hospital with a non-life-threatening head injury, according to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. Five others suffered storm-related, non-severe injuries, according to the department.
