Powerful winds — including a tornado

This image was taken of a funnel cloud just south and west of our location near Jamestown, North Dakota.

A complex storm system wreaked havoc in parts of North Dakota, northern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin, with tornadoes, large hail and strong wind gusts late Friday night (June 20th) into early Saturday morning. Wind gusts measuring 95 to 100 MPH were reported according to the weather service.

Friday evening around 10 PM, Adam had all the campers and staff shelter in "the Rock", the utility building on campus with the best tornado protection. We had tornado warnings throughout the remainder of the evening and early morning, so the campers spent the night there instead of returning to their cabins. Cooperstown Bible Camp sustained downed trees and power was lost until Sunday afternoon.

The trunk landed between two golf carts just outside the door into the "Rock".

At first light the damage to the camp was profound. Just outside the main entrance to "the Rock" was a large, tall pine tree that fell towards the building. The top just slightly damaged the roof and rain gutters. The massive trunk landed between two parked golf carts.

Split the trunk of this tree like a popsicle stick.

Mike was up on the roof after we removed the tree and started covering the damage with a tarp in anticipation of more rain.

The "Nazareth" boy's cabin, took a direct hit from a fallen tree along with the maintenance shop. Saturday morning I led a team made up of four camp staffers in removing the tangled tree debris from the roof. Along with multiple trees down throughout the camp we also lost two power lines downed in the storm. One of the trucks parked near the "Lodge" took a tree limb through the windshield. We thank God that no one here in the camp was hurt.

Evidence our Heavenly Father's protection is all around the camp.

As for us, we had no damage to our trailer or truck from this extensive wind event, even with our location near a line of trees. There is plenty of tree damage near our site from the wind, even though we didn't experience a "tornado" making landfall. Karen and I played a round of disc golf through the camp and got a first hand survey of the number of trees damaged and downed by the storm. It looks like our last week in camp will involve cleaning up and repairing the damage caused by the storm. Please join us in praying for many hands to clear the downed trees as a new group of campers will arrive Monday afternoon.