Tornado touched down at restaurant, RV park ahead of Irma making landfall
Adrianna Iwasinski, Investigative Reporter
UMATILLA, Fla. – The Lake County Sheriff's Office confirmed that a tornado touched down at a restaurant and RV park in Umatilla ahead of Hurricane Irma making landfall in Central Florida.
The Old Mill Stream RV Resort off North Central Avenue took a direct hit.
"Never seen devastation like this before," Wally Medley said.
He is the manager at the RV resort and was one of the 20 or so people who were here taking shelter when the tornado hit.
"As I went to reach for the door, the door was rattling," Medley said. "And I just heard a freight train."
Once the storm had passed, they stepped outside of the building, and were surprised at what they saw.
Some RVs were hardly touched, while others were obliterated.
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Florida is taking a direct hit by the Hurricane which madep.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #454545} Broken tree branches block roads in the Coral Beach neighborhood as Hurricane Irma hits the southern part of the state Sept. 10, 2017 in Fort Lauderdale.p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #454545} People walk past a building where the roof was blown off by Hurricane Irma on September 10, 2017 in Miami, Florida.
Debris from Hurricane Irma is piled on Vassar Street in Orlando on Monday, Sept. 18.
"There's about 20 units in here that have either been flipped over or totally destroyed," Medley said. "It just devastated this area."
Medley took News 6 on a tour of the resort grounds. He said many of the people who stay here are snowbirds and thankfully were not here. But now the ones whose RVs were affected will have to be contacted, and have their insurance claims adjusters help them take care of this mess.
Until then, Medley said he can't touch anything, and is stuck cleaning up the trees that came toppling down all over the property.
"I'll never underestimate Mother Nature again," Medley said.
Medley said of the 22 residents who took shelter inside the building on the resort ground property, none of their RVs were affected by the tornado.
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