This week many around BC got the chance to see something they had never seen in their lives take place in this part of the world and that was to see what looked like a tornado form in the Metro Vancouver region of the province.

From UBC, around the airport, from the mountains, there were dozens of different vantage points being shared of the event, what media has described as being a “possible tornado” in Vancouver, it could be seen across various photos and videos on social media.

The historic weather event in Vancouver caused a bit of damage that crews had to later respond to and cleanup afterward. The notice of a tornado watch came as quite a shock to those around the province who have lived in this region for decades and never seen anything like this take place.

It is extremely rare to see this sort of weather event with a tornado in Vancouver or the Metro Vancouver region.

Tornado or Waterspout?

Industry experts have already provided their hypothesis for why this possible rare tornado in Vancouver took place.

Trees were uprooted because of the high winds and Environment Canada has said that further investigation is needed before they can determine if it was in fact a tornado that took place.

Environment Canada had issued a tornado watch previously for the Metro Vancouver region which is an extremely rare event.

At first it seems that the unusual weather event was being referred to as a ‘waterspout’ event that was seen off of the Coast and there was disagreement over whether it was in fact a tornado.

Environment Canada has recently issued a statement confirming that it was a tornado that touched ground at UBC over the weekend which people saw in photos and videos, as well as witnessing first-hand in the region. It’s reported that it touched down at 5:10 p.m. around the UBC region and the preliminary rating for the Vancouver tornado is EF0.