Environment Canada will be continuing to look over the data gathered from the storms which raged through Saskatchewan Tuesday night, looking if there were more tornadoes which may have touched down in the province. There were four confirmed tornadoes. The reports came from Val Marie and Golden Prairie, as well as two separate events in Wood Mountain.

“There is the potential for more tornadoes as the day to day goes on,” explained John Paul Cragg with Environment Canada. The warning preparedness meteorologist explained it can take a few days for all the reports to get to them.

The key indicator for tornadoes in many areas is the rotation signature on the radar, but it isn’t always an indicator of a tornado.

“We do keep track of where the rotation on those storms were, and where the potential areas were that tornadoes could occur,” said Cragg. “Even looking at the radar data, tornadoes can occur where there isn’t any rotation showing on radar so we really do look for those reports afterwards to confirm or include tornadoes to our database.”

There were three unconfirmed reports of tornadoes Tuesday evening. The reports, on social media, came from the Minton, Tribune and Ocean Man areas.

Cragg explained there is always the case of damage caused by winds being mistaken for damage from a tornado. He said those downburst winds, or plough winds, are generally the cause.

In Mankota, there were wind speeds of 122 kilometres an hour reported due to a downburst wind. The winds can also be extremely localized.

With the threat of the storms having passed over the province, it appears the forecast will be calling for sunshine for the next few days, leading into the weekend. Temperatures will slowly make their way back up to the high 20’s but will be fairly close to normal for this time of year until the weekend.