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http://www.meteosottoceneri.ch/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=49&Itemid=55SPRINGFIELD, Mass. - Tornadoes roared through Massachusetts on Wednesday, as violent winds caused damage in about two dozen communities, ripping off roofs, uprooting trees, scattering debris and leaving at least four dead throughout the state.
The governor said the death toll was preliminary.
The storm pulverized or sheared off the tops of roofs on Main Street in Springfield, a city of more than 150,000 about 90 miles west of Boston. A mounted video camera captured dramatic footage of a debris-filled funnel as it swept into downtown from the west, then crossed the Connecticut River.
Gov. Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency and called up 1,000 National Guardsmen after the storms, which brought scenes of devastation recently wreaked in the South and Midwest to a part of the country where such violent weather isn't a way of life.
The Rev. Bob Marrone of The First Church of Monson said the storm cleared a view he's never seen across the valley where the town sits.
"I can see the plywood of roofs, and see houses where most of the house is gone," said Marrone, whose church's steeple was knocked down. "The road that runs up in front of my house ... There's so many trees down, it's completely impassable."
Thomas Walsh, a spokesman for Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno, told The Associated Press he was looking out his City Hall window around 4:30 p.m. when he saw the funnel.
I could see this massive cloud of debris floating around in a circular, cylindrical fashion," he said.
At least four people were killed from the storms, Patrick said.
Sarno said more than 40 people have been admitted to hospitals in Springfield.
"It looked like birds were flying out of the trees and it was rubble," said Martha Vachon of Photography by Duval of Palmer, who was photographing the Minnechaug Regional High School prom in downtown Springfield, which went on as planned.
"You could see things were coming," recalled Deborah McCarthy, who witnessed the tornado in Springfield from inside an office building.
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