On Monday, April 18, Amy and Micah Ping were watching the heavy rain and wind from their Lake Samish home when they spotted a waterspout in the middle of the lake. After it formed, it traveled toward them, ravaging their property.
The National Weather Service (NWS) Seattle verified the event and classified it as a waterspout since it had formed over the lake. Because of its rapid dissipation as it came onshore, it was not considered a tornado.
Samantha Borth, a forecaster for the NWS Seattle, said the event was very rare and it hardly showed up on the radar.
The small waterspout lasted for a minute or two but managed to blow apart the family’s shed and fence as well as pick up a canoe and a 300-pound rowboat and fling them both toward the house.
“I got really worried when I saw the boat start flying and the canoe going up in the air,” Micah Ping said. “It made me really worried for my kids because I wasn’t sure they were away from the windows.”
Before the waterspout formed, the family was sitting down for dinner on what was, previously, a typical overcast day in the Lake Samish area. Out of nowhere, heavy rain and the wind began to pummel their windows. The Pings both started recording from their phones at separate ends of the house while the waterspout formed.
“It happened almost instantly. It came on with no warning and the whole thing lasted less than two minutes. And it was back to this semi-windy and kind of almost like nothing ever happened” Micah Ping said.
The Pings’ two children were watching the stormy weather with their parents when the waterspout formed. Micah Ping said that his younger son, 3-year-old Quinn, thought the waterspout was cool, however, 5-year-old Elisha was traumatized by the event.
Throughout the evening, Micah Ping said that Elisha kept asking, “What if it happens again? What if another one comes? What if, what if it’s worse? What if it’s bigger?”
The Pings were worried, too, but the couple had never seen one in the 20 years they had lived on Lake Samish. Seeing another was unlikely.
Micah Ping estimates they suffered around $2,000 in damages to their dock, boats and other belongings that were thrown into the air by the waterspout.
