Storm across state causes damage in Lakes Region

The Granite State was under a tornado watch Thursday afternoon, and while no twisters have been confirmed, the Town of Tuftonboro — notably Cow Island — sustained damage from high winds and torrential rain.

“At this time, we cannot confirm whether a tornado touched down on Cow Island,” said Brenda Larson, community outreach program planner for the Homeland Security and Emergency Management team of the state Department of Safety. “The National Weather Service is responsible for conducting damage assessments and determining whether a tornado occurred.”

Justin Arnott, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Gray, Maine, wrote in an email sent at 4:20 a.m. on Friday, that while the weather service staff heard of wind damage in the area, he did not have any specific reports of a tornado. He said tree damage in the area lines up with the storm information he had, saying there were dozens of wind damage reports from across the area.

“We don't have wind measurements from that location, but there were reports of winds in excess of 60 miles per hour across southern New Hampshire with wind damage reports (trees/wires down) consistent with winds of that strength,” Arnott wrote in an email just after 8:30 a.m. Friday

Tuftonboro Assistant Fire Chief Chris Morgan said his department had been spending the day investigating the storm, which he said got especially bad around 4:30 p.m. on June 18.

“We definitely had microburst activity, but we haven’t been able to confirm a tornado, yet,” Morgan said. “We have a beat crew that is mobilizing to conduct an investigation.”

This investigation involves a water-based assessment around the 522-acre Cow Island. The department is also sending a drone over the landlocked section of Tuftonboro, but couldn’t fly over Lake Winnipesaukee on Friday due to the strong winds.

Cow Island is the largest in Tuftonboro, and one of the largest on the lake. People live there, and some attempt to stay 11 months or even the full year, but most are seasonal residents. Morgan said there were residents on the island during the storm.

The storm led to a “couple dozen” calls, most for trees on wires and structures. There are two YMCA camps in Tuftonboro — Pleasant Valley and Northwoods — which he said were hit especially hard, with “at least a dozen structures affected or totaled” from trees. There was also damage reported on another camp, located on Sandy Island.

“We are in the preliminary stages of getting statistics together,” Morgan said.

There was a person injured when a tree came down on their parked car, who refused to be taken to the hospital.

Bixby Shores Road had trees down and logging crews were present, which led the dirt road with seasonal cottages to be closed. No other roads in town were shut down.

Most of the response by the Tuftonboro Fire Department came Thursday night, and they spent Friday assessing damage.

On Thursday night, the state Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management sent a press release stating that as of 6 p.m., more than 20,000 customers were without power, due to severe rain and thunderstorms throughout the Granite State. Director Robert Buxton recommended precautions, and provided phone numbers for power companies for customers to report outages.

“If you lose power, keep you and your family safe,” Buxton stated in the release. “Never run a generator indoors. If you come across downed wires, stay away and call 911. Utility crews are out working hard to restore outages as they happen. If you come across a crew on the road, give them room to work.”

Colin Manning, spokesperson for New Hampshire Electric Cooperative, said there were at maximum 7,500 outages for customers they serve. Outages spanned from the Connecticut River Valley, to the Lakes Region, and also areas like Conway, and Raymond.

Crews quickly dropped that number to 2,800, and then made further progress Thursday evening. Aside from spot outages, Manning said they were all taken care of by Friday.

"They did a really great job getting everyone back up," Manning said.

According to Eversource spokesperson William Hinkle, the company had 4,292 customers served by the Tilton center who lost power from the storm. He said the Tilton work center primarily covers the Lakes Region.

Laconia seemed to have dodged the worst of it, with Deputy Fire Chief Louis Loutrel saying they didn’t have any weather-related calls.

“We got a lot of rain, a bit of wind, but nothing other than a couple tree limbs” down, Loutrel said.

Loutrel said he and Chief Tim Joubert walked around Weirs Beach to notify vendors the storm was coming, and advise them to either shut down, or make sure things were secure. He said there was no issue to note.

“Myself, and Chief Joubert, talked to every single vendor,” Loutrel said.

Loutrel noted his department did not get called to any other community through Lakes Region Mutual Fire Aid, but he did hear over the scanner about weather-related calls in Gilford, Gilmanton, and Sanbornton.

Gilford Fire Chief Steve Carrier said there was only one call directly related to the storm, when a large tree came down across wires near Ames Farm Inn on Lake Shore Road at 4:10 p.m. on June 18. He said this closed the road, as the tree blocked both lanes, and Eversource crews needed to tend to the electrical wires.

Gilford Fire also responded to a wire down at a residence in the same neighborhood shortly after, and then at 6:53 p.m., they responded to Mountain Drive for a cable line down. He said it was not electrical, presenting no hazard.

“It was still breezy at that point, but it could have been something that weakened during the storm,” Carrier said.

Daniel Simpson shared a video with The Daily Sun of intense winds hitting his residence on Gilford’s Welch Island

“We got hit pretty hard on Welch,” Simpson said. “Snapped a couple umbrellas in half and tore the bimini cover off my pontoon boat.”

On Camp Island, resident Brit Munsterteiger told The Daily Sun while it was windy with a “crazy amount of rain,” it cleared up quickly.

“I got out here at 6 p.m. and it was beautiful,” Munsterteiger wrote in an email at 9:11 p.m. on Thursday.

A firefighter from Meredith said while there were some trees down, there was no major damage reported. One resident shared to Facebook a photo of a large tree that came down on their deck, narrowly missing the home.

Gilmanton firefighter Matt Greene said the weather was bad between 4 and 5 p.m. Thursday, and while Crystal Lake Road was closed due to a tree coming down, damage was minimal, and no injuries were reported.

“We had a couple trees down over wires, and one blocking the road, but for a tornado watch, it was pretty light,” Greene said. “That was it. We got lucky.”