The Day The Tornado Came To Beltsville!

The Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC) after the 2001 tornado. Photo by Billy McNeel.

Twenty-five years ago, this month held a lot of pain. Just after the attacks of September 11th, an F3 tornado swept our area on September 24th. It hit Beltsville, the BARC campus, College Park and the UMD grounds, and then Laurel as well.

I lived in College Park at the time and my mother, who grew up in the Midwest and knew the warning signs, saw the funnel cloud and ushered myself and my three brothers into the basement. We heard the wind roar past the house and then it was eerily silent. My mother worked at the then Linens N Things in the shopping center near to the IKEA (which became Best Buy) but thankfully wasn’t scheduled for work that day. The front of the building was dented and caved in, as it was in the path of the tornado. We were without power for two days as repairs were made.

In Beltsville proper, the roof nearly came off St. Joseph’s on Rt 1, power was out for many days and trees/debris clogged the roads. There was also extensive damage to the BARC campus. From the Under the Clock Tower newsletter:

“Slate and roofing material were torn off of Bldgs. 003, 006, 009, 011 and 050…the greatest damage occurred to the greenhouses…over 2,000 panes of glass were broken in Range 2 and Bldg .050.”

Throughout Beltsville, many residents were also affected. I recently asked folks in the Beltsville Matters Facebook group, for what they remembered of that time.

“Tried to get home from working on the U campus. Drove north on Virginia Manor, but it was blocked by a downed tree. Coming back south was able to take a right turn onto Powder Mill, but the trees were very damaged.” Charles B. Cranston

“One of the buildings [Montpelier village condominiums] was ripped clean off.” Alison Bauer

“I remember the sky as I turned onto cedar Lane it looked like two huge snakes writhing in the clouds” George Woo