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A town is facing a mammoth clean-up after roofs were ripped from homes and community buildings were destroyed by a freak tornado in Western Australia’s south west.
Approximately 2000 homes are still without power after the 60-metre-wide tornado, with wind speeds of over 150 kilometres per hour, hit the Bunbury suburb of Withers about 4pm (6pm AEST) yesterday.
There were 146 calls for help and about 40 homes have been damaged.
There have been no reports of any deaths and only two people suffered minor injuries across the impacted area.
The clean up has now begun but the task is so huge, emergency service crews have sent for backup to assist.
Impacted residents are now looking for places to stay and those still waiting for their power to return are expected to have to wait until at least Sunday afternoon.
The tornado only lasted four minutes but it caused panic as it wreaked havoc.
Children ran for cover after a PCYC building was torn in half, with the roof collapsing into itself.
The Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES) has issued a hazmat warning around the PCYC building due to asbestos.
It also lifted the roof off a building in Bunbury Regional Prison with two prison buildings damaged and 17 inmates were moved to other facilities.
“What we saw yesterday was an incredibly confronting and in many ways traumatic incident,” corrective services minister Paul Papalia said.
