The National Weather Service confirmed in its preliminary findings that an EF-1 tornado hit Columbus' south side during Tuesday's derecho.
The NWS's survey team evaluated damage in south Columbus, particularly from East Hinman Avenue eastward across Parsons Avenue. This included at Lincoln Park's Barack Community Center, which had its roof blown off.
Governor Mike DeWine also amended an earlier state of emergency declaration on Thursday, adding Franklin County. The order included Perry and Muskingum counties earlier, which were affected by severe flooding. One person died in the village of Roseville.
The NWS said the damage in Columbus's south side exhibited "a convergent pattern" and that in addition to tree damage, there was structural damage that included roof damage to some homes and businesses.
WOSU visited the scene Tuesday and Wednesday and found the metal roof of the community center wrapped around trees and crumbled like a plastic tarp. Trees and branches were strewn everywhere, power lines were down and the nearby community pool's yellow umbrella was thrown across the property.
On Tuesday, many residents questioned why sirens didn't go off.
Franklin County Emergency Management and Homeland Security said that it doesn't activate tornado sirens unless a tornado warning is issued.
The NWS told WOSU watches and warnings are issued based off what the primary concern is for a storm, which for this storm was winds. A severe thunderstorm warning was issued for Franklin County, which doesn't rule out tornadoes.
Nearby on Hinman and Morrill avenues, several buildings were severely damaged. A camper, which a homeowner's father lived in, was crushed entirely by a fallen tree.
A homeless woman said she was walking to the store when what she thought was a tornado hit. She said her tent was blown away and the wind almost picked her up.
NWS meteorologist and Franklin County EMA explain lack of sirens and warning after tornado is confirmed
On Thursday, NWS Meteorologist Christine Aiena told WOSU the confirmed tornado and the conditions that would have tipped NWS off about a possible tornado appeared very rapidly.
"This is a very quick spin up tornado. And so by the time we were able to see it on radar, it was already doing damage and then it spun down almost just as fast," Aiena said.
Aiena explained that the speed at which these conditions developed was why a watch and warning weren't issued. She said these storm systems are quite common producers of very quick spin-up tornadoes, especially in the Ohio Valley region.
Aiena said the weather service office will work to improve their response in the future. She said the office always does a "post event review" to look at what went well and what we want to work on in the future.
"There's absolutely work being done on that and we you know we take it very seriously and we take it to heart because we definitely don't we don't want to have incidents like this," Aiena said.
Franklin County EMA director Jeff Young told WOSU the county relies on NWS to issue a tornado warning before sirens sound so information is consistent to all residents across all platforms. He said that the weather service did its job and he fully agrees with Aiena's analysis.
Young said its important people rely on more than just the sirens and check their phones, radio and TV.
"Our siren system is just one tool of a larger alerting and warning strategy. And these need to work altogether," Young said.
He said a lot of this comes down to public education and that the public should take lesser alerts like severe thunderstorms seriously.
"It's not just tornadoes. Severe thunderstorm warnings, flash flood warnings, lightning alerts. All of these things have life safety issues and risks associated with them. So we really want to kind of help educate everybody that you need to be aware of all of these conditions," Young said.
Young acknowledged that homeless people — like a woman WOSU spoke too whose tent was blown away on Morrill Avenue near the tornado — may present extreme challenges with this system. He said that is why it is important sirens are still used.
"That really goes to the only thing we can do in that case is really the educational piece of that. Of being aware and, you know, how do you get your trusted information? And everybody is slightly different on where they go," Young said.
Young said homeless people rely on shelters and outreach workers to get them proper information.
"We're constantly talking about that, especially when it comes to weather extremes. Temperature really impacts those who are out in the environment," he said.
What comes next as officials continue to assess damage, get power back on?
Aiena said weather officials are continuing to assess damage in Columbus and around Ohio in places like Brown, Adams, Highland and Champaign counties
The NWS also looked at damage in Upper Arlington and found that straight line winds of up to 100 mph caused damage in that area as the storm headed east towards Clintonville and John Glenn Columbus International Airport, where 82 mph winds were recorded Tuesday.
Aiena said NWS did rule out a tornado in that area.
"A tornado has been ruled out. We have no visible signs of a tornadic circulation or any type of convergent pattern up in of the Upper Arlington area, on that northern side of the Columbus Metro," Aiena said.
Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther convened city leaders for a press conference for the third day in a row to discuss available resources and recovery efforts at the Columbus Metropolitan Library's Parsons Avenue Branch.
At the press conference, Ginther said that by the time it started before noon, 30,000 residents were still without power. The day before, AEP Ohio President Marc Reitter estimated that the bulk of 60,000 remaining outages would be restores by the end of the day Wednesday.
Ginther said workers are making progress, but that he wants power restored as soon as possible. He didn't say whether he was happy with the progress made so far.
"All those crews have been more spread out around the entire city. Now that we're down to those 30,000 households primarily in the northwest and southeast, we'll make more progress faster," Ginther said.
Ginther said in a statement after the press conference, when the tornado was confirmed, that "whether you call it a tornado or derecho, our neighbors and neighborhoods have been devastated.”
