Four days after a tornado passed through Essa Township and knocked over a thousand trees at the Tiffin Centre – it was open for business on Saturday.
Tuesday’s tornado that hit Angus cut a 150 meter wild slice out of the Tiffin Conservation Centre too.
“We lost approximately 12 acres of forested area, thousands of trees – it’s almost impossible to count,” says Clint Collis with the Tiffin Conservation Centre.
Many of the trees left standing are snapped in two. Others are leaning and could fall at any time. One of the areas hardest hit was the group campsite. The camp shed is under the trees and the economic impact of losing this area runs over $10,000.
“It’s a big loss, it’s booked every weekend,” added Collis.
Many of the trails are closed and all day on Saturday Collis was reminding people to walk only on those that remained open. Collis’ father had been building an outdoor fireplace in the forest but on Tuesday he called Clint to say he wouldn’t be showing up to work on it. That fireplace is in the middle of all the fallen trees.
“Thankfully he wasn’t there,” says Collis.
And thankfully there was nobody in the Tiffin sugar shack either, a big maple crashed on top of it leaving the future of Tiffin’s maple syrup production in question.
The 200 km/h winds spared a nearby hydro tower and the main building that houses education centre lost only one piece of siding.
Collis says it will take decades for the forest to return to what it was before the tornado but the trees like people are resilient. And despite a few lost trees Rory McDonald’s wedding in the Tiffin forest on Saturday is going ahead as planned.
“We game through it and absolutely nothing is going to stop me from marrying the woman that I love.”
