At least 1 person seriously injured, structures damaged after tornadoes and storms sweep through Maryland
CNN
By Adrienne Winston and Steve Almasy, CNN
(CNN) — Storms with damaging tornadoes hit parts of Maryland on Wednesday, leaving at least one person seriously injured and knocking down trees on homes and other buildings in several areas.
In Gaithersburg, Maryland, one of five people who were trapped in a ranch-style home after it collapsed in the storm was taken to a hospital with traumatic injuries, Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Assistant Chief David Pazos told CNN.
Two other homes in the densely packed suburb with about 70,000 residents were significantly damaged by trees, according to the fire department’s chief spokesperson Pete Piringer. The DC-area National Weather Service office said the tornado was spotted in Montgomery County just after 7:35 p.m. ET.
A tornado also was reported over Arbutus, Maryland – near Baltimore – around 8:55 p.m. ET, the National Weather Service office there said, moving east at 25 mph. Details about what damage that tornado caused, if any, to structures were not immediately available. The US Storm Prediction Center said numerous trees and power lines were down in the area.
The storm prediction center had eight tornado reports from Maryland as of 10:30 p.m.
As for the Gaithersburg tornado: Several people were removed from the damaged structures and transported to hospitals, emergency officials said.
Montgomery County emergency management officials said the first tornado was over Gaithersburg, about 22 miles northwest of Washington, DC, shortly after 7:40 p.m. ET.
Photos and video from social media showed a moderate to large funnel on the ground as the storm moved east through parts of Gaithersburg toward Olney. The storm crossed I-270 around 7:30 p.m. ET.
In the Sykesville, Maryland, area, there were no immediate ports of injuries but at least 10 structures were damaged, mostly by the high winds, according to fire department spokesperson Bill Rehkopf. One was significantly damaged by a tree.
Weak tornadoes are not uncommon in the DC region, but only a handful in recorded history have been EF3 or stronger. In 2002, an F4 tornado devastated parts of La Plata, Maryland, south of DC. That storm killed three people and caused more than $100 million in damage, according to data from the National Weather Service.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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CNN’s Ritu Prasad, Sara Smart and Robert Shackleford contributed to this report.
