Already dealing with three local emergencies as it tries to recover from the destructive Norte fire and a surge in coastal erosion from two El Niño-related Pacific storms, San Clemente may now be facing damage from yet another climate-fueled emergency: a tornado.
The possible twister whipped through a San Clemente golf course Wednesday evening, toppling or snapping off sections of trees and leaving a trail of green carcasses across the typically manicured park, according to videos and photos reviewed by The Times. It doesn’t appear anyone was injured.
The National Weather Service said a team was headed out to the course Thursday to determine if the damage was caused by a tornado, but they had not yet reached consensus.
“The cause is uncertain, it’s certainty wind-related, but it’s a matter of what kind of wind,” said Kyle Wheeler, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in San Diego. “There’s been a couple of different storms that have moved through San Clemente.”
Just before 6 p.m. Wednesday, the weather service issued a special alert about a strong thunderstorm tracking 11 miles south of San Clemente that could bring wind gusts up to 55 mph, warning people to seek shelter inside.
Around that time, golfers at the San Clemente Municipal Golf Course reported heavy rain followed by a possible funnel, which left a row of strewn branches, downed trees and one trunk completely uprooted, according to social media posts and local news reports.
An Instagram post from one golfer, who appears to be former San Clemente Mayor Tim Brown, showed some of the damage. He said it was raining too hard to capture what he called a cyclone.
“There was a wind gust, it was a funnel,” Brown said in a post on Instagram. “That just tore through this whole section right here. … It just ripped on a straight line.”
Jon Malnekoff’s home borders the golf course, and he said he’s positive the wind burst was a tornado. He said a plexiglass windowpane facing the fairway was completely blown inward during the burst of wind.
“It flew across my living room,” Malnekoff, 86, said. “It just scared the living you-know-what.”
Somehow the burst only caused minor scratches on his floor, he said, but his entire neighborhood was littered with blown trash cans and stray tree limbs, not to mention the severe damage to the course.
The storm on Wednesday that may have spawned a tornado was one in a barrage of strong storms across Southern California this week that caused localized flooding, strong rains and high winds, including a swift-water rescue in Los Angeles. Much of the area remained under a flood advisory through Thursday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service, which intermittently issued several other urgent alerts about strong thunderstorms, some that specifically warned about the possibility of tornadoes.
The small coastal city of San Clemente has for years been dealing with coastal erosion that continues to threaten a crucial rail line, but a recent surge in strong swells fueled by a strengthening super El Niño — first in September and then earlier this month — has intensified issues: again shuttering the railway, reshaping swaths of the city’s beaches and damaging its iconic pier.
Then, the southern Orange County city faced a new climate-fueled emergency last week, this one in its inland hillsides, where the Norte fire quickly burned toward hillside neighborhoods and destroyed six homes.
Officials are hopeful this week’s heavy rains have helped ease wildfire concerns, but such storms also raise the risk of debris flows or mudslides in burn scars, as well as flooding.
Staff writers Hannah Fry, Noah Haggerty and Gabriel San Román contributed to this post.
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