Rare 3 a.m. twister awakens Ontario's 2025 tornado season
The first twister for Ontario this year occurred at night earlier this month. The nocturnal timing of it makes up a low percentage of the province's tornadoes since 1981
After an investigation led by the Northern Tornadoes Project (NTP) earlier this week, Ontario has seen its first tornado of 2025.
The NTP conducted ground and drone surveys on tree and hydro pole damage on May 20, revealing a tornado occurred in Lakeside, Ont., on May 16, roughly at 3 a.m. A line of nocturnal storms moved through southwestern Ontario on May 15 and 16, resulting in the early-morning twister.
SEE ALSO: Canada's tornado count rises but this province is noticeably at zero still
Lakeside is located northeast of London, Ont., and northwest of Woodstock, Ont.
NTP gave the twister a preliminary damage rating of EF-0. It had a maximum wind speed of 115 km/h, track length of 3.6 kilometres and a path width of 160 metres.
It should be noted that nocturnal tornadoes (10 p.m. to 6 a.m. time frame) do occur throughout Canada, but they are not common. However, Ontario registered four nighttime twisters in 2024.
But when you look at the overall occurrence of nighttime tornadoes in Ontario, with data covering 1981 to 2024, the province's percentage of them is on the low side (6.2 per cent). That means out of 883 tornadoes, 55 of them were nocturnal.
In Canada, the percentage is even lower. During the same time period, 175 out of 3,080 tornadoes in the country occurred at night (5.7 per cent).
May 12 is average date for Ontario's first tornado in the year
The first tornado occurred a bit later than usual, with May 12 earmarked as the average date of the latest occurrence in the year over a 10-year period (from 2014-2024), especially since it saw a March 16 tornado last year--tying its own record for the earliest in a yearly period.
Here are the dates of Ontario's first tornado in the year from 2014-2024. As previously mentioned, May 12 is the median date of it occurring.
2024: March 16
2023: June 13
2022: May 15
2021: May 25
2020: June 8
2019: June 2
2018: June 13
2017: April 11
2016: March 16
2015: May 30
2014: May 13
Taking them into account, Ontario averages 1.3 tornadoes in May and 18.3 in a year.
With files from Tyler Hamilton and Matthew Grinter, meteorologists at The Weather Network.