MONTREAL — Marc-Andre Bourgeois-Gaudet was in his boat off the shores of Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Que., last Friday when he saw several funnel clouds descending from the sky like tornadoes. As he got closer, the rain started falling harder than anything he’d ever experienced, he said. “It was like having a waterfall fall on my head.” The […]

’Tornadoes over water’ seen across Eastern Canada this summer

MONTREAL — Marc-Andre Bourgeois-Gaudet was in his boat off the shores of Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Que., last Friday when he saw several funnel clouds descending from the sky like tornadoes. As he got closer, the rain started falling harder than anything he’d ever experienced, he said. “It was like having a waterfall fall on my head.” The […]

Waterspouts can “certainly sink a boat,” but most are slow-moving enough that they can be avoided, he said. Bourgeois-Gaudet, from Iles-de-la-Madeleine, said he never felt truly in danger during his close encounter with the waterspout. He said that while the water was a little choppy, the wind was never high enough to risk capsizing. “The hardest part was seeing where I was going” due to rain. Sills said that since the tornadoes project started in 2017, its members have documented about 15 waterspouts a year. This year, they’re already up to 18 confirmed or suspected events, making this year slightly above average so far, he said. The waterspouts in Quebec drew plenty of attention — likely because they’re not reported as frequently as in the Great Lakes area. Sills said some of this year’s Quebec waterspouts are the first to be documented along the St. Lawrence River since 2017 — but that’s likely only because more people are seeing them and documenting them, often on social media. “The conditions certainly can happen there,” he said, adding, “I wouldn’t say it’s rare, just not well documented.” He said that, due to improved reporting, the number of tornadoes documented in Canada has risen from about 60 per year prior to 2017 to close to 100 on average.