Thank you for this. We were on Ontario Street. It was a dancer, i.e. one house would be destroyed, the next one unscathed. Four kids home alone, both parents are work. Our house was built by a Finlander; it was strong, with a steambath in the basement. The sky was a sickly greenish colour. As it began to hit, our dog Brutus was outside on a chain. He was above the ground, horizontal and being choked. We formed a chain, put the least favourite brother at the end, and reeled Brutus in. The four of us got down to the basement. I remember going out aftewards, amazed at how variable the damage was. Glad Tidings Pentecostal Tabernacle had scripturally built on a solid rock. The frame survived, the inside were gutted. A neighbour lost their livingroom, and their brand new colour tv; fun to watch hockey on a Sudbury Saturday night. They were unhurt. Six souls lost their lives. It changes your perception of the world.

I was a milkman and was halfway up Marymount College hill when it hit . Along the road where these super tall Lombardo trees. The tips of them were touching the sidewalk . My milk truck made it to the back of the College were the kitchen entrance was. The small parking lot was also at the edge of a cliff which overlooked downtown Sudbury. My truck was at a dead stop and swaying from side to side .. Luckily it was freshly loaded with milk which wheighed it down a lot. The nun in the back kitchen was waving me to take a run for the back door which i did . I wasn't sure that i would make it . I remember it like it was yesterday.

My dad just got home from graveyard shift from 9 shaft in Creighton, I was 7 and sleeping. The tornado missed our house by less than a mile, we lived south just off Highway 17. At the time they were constructing the new Highway 17 and my dad noticed that guys were getting ready to blast the rock face close to our house and were scrambling and set off 2 blasts which was unusual and early. We knew a bad storm had hit but didn't know how bad until a neighbour told us what had happened. We had to go shopping in Sudbury and I remember passing the broken tressel on the way in. I remember that vividly.

Lived here my entire life and had no idea lol thanks!

I was 14 when this happened, living just north of Sudbury. We got the very black sky, high winds and some heavy rain. An Aunt and Uncle of mine, who lived near the Memorial hospital, recounted how they saw the storm coming towards their house and ran into their basement bathroom. Moments later they looked up to see the sky: the entire top of their house as blown off .

I was very young at the time and at our camp on Fairbanks, east of Sudbury. Sitting on the dock, i'll never forget the color of the sky and seeing water fly upwards. My father grabbed me about 4 minutes before the dock disappeared. My wife was about two at the time, she started crying so her parents put her in their car and went for a drive to settle her down. They saw the tornado from a distance and when they got back to their apartment, it was destroyed. That apartment can be seen in this video at 6:57 on the right side of the church. They lived on the top floor. Thanks for doing this video, it was very well done.

What a superb short documentary, absolutely brilliant piece of work guys.

I was 4 years old when it hit.We lived in Lockerby.I can remember seeing pieces of tree limbs blowing around from my bedroom window.I also remember a birch bark tree fell on my dads box trailer.I don't think our house suffered any damage though.

Nice job guys.

Thanks for the info. Did not realize Canada had tornado problems too. Take care and stay safe, Rob

Nicely put together guys, loved it👍👍

Great documentary, Doug! Well explained and great drama. The interviews with your Dad and Jamie really brought it to life! Great job!

Awesome video guys. WOW omg waht a mess.

I ran an Ambulance Service in 1970. Sudbury with four hospitals including Coppercliff and it's 7 ambulances with one from Elliot Lake, Manitoulin, Espanola, Onoping Parry Sound. In West Nippissing we had three ambulnes from North Bay, one from Haileybury, one from Burk Falls. One death in Field Ontario. The Sudbury area ambulances answered 1,025 calls in 24 hrs. It was a Tornado that bypassed Varner the West arm hit Cache Bay's West limits missed Sturgeon Falls but travelled North to Field and died out beyond Martin River and Temagami.

I didn't realize that Canada had that many tornadoes. Living in tornado alley here in the states, we are aware of the dangers. Sad to see the destruction and hear of the loss of life. Very well made film Doug and Jamie.

Well done! A great summary of a terrifying moment in my life. No one in my family was hurt physically, but it has certainly left a lifelong fear of high winds and bad storms.

I had to watch , because I was there and experienced the absolute terror . I left the town a few years later during 74 -75 ...only returned once . The sad parts are the people injured by being carried for hundreds of feet , with resulting broken bones / a broken back is remembered by a senior graduated from school student . Speak to M.A. Jackpine if you can still find her as it was her former boyfriend . I am not sure who is left around the area , but I can list ,many , many people who were there when it happened . I often think of the people and the town , and the obvious good memories of young adulthood . plus a bit of the bad , lol, but all in all ...nice archive footage . Tom Squires ...

Oh my. Terrible situation but I enjoyed watching the film. You guys did a fine job on it!!! News reporters back then really reported the news, and with authority!

I heard this story many times. Was neat to see Jamie again.. Been a long long time. Since junior school!

As a few other folks said, I too didn't think y'all had many tornadoes over there brother!! We have tons of them here in the Sip and it's tragic to see the damage they do, well done on this one brother!! Dan

Very cool doc, thank you for making and sharing it!

I was in that working at the copper refinery , It was a unforgetable day for sure ,, Thank God not more were injured or died ...

Thanks for sharing this Doug.. You should consider doing Narration on documentaries..! Cheers Famo59 👍🍺🤓⛏

Life was a lot simpler back then in the late 60's & 70's, but when something like this happened without warning had to be horrific. I never thought of severe summer weather or tornado's in Canada. Excellent history video guys! Stay safe up there.

Really very bad situation... İm sorry friend. Hope it does not happen again my friend. 👍

Lively was not a nice sight, I had friends in casts and stitches brushed from head to toes and some lost their homes..we were blessed not to have more deaths. I didn’t know Blanchard Bell then, the man speaking in the video saying he was in the home with his wife and four kids..but I had the pleasure of meeting him when he gave his granddaughter away at her wedding in July 2017, such a wonderful person. Thanks for putting this together and sharing publicly. I really thought it was fantastic.

Great job putting this together it was a ton of great information like a TV documentary. Learned a lot thanks guys!

Wow I had no idea. Love this video format guys. Awesome job!!

I never knew you all got tornados, that is crazy. The one that hit her in March of this year, changed lives and landscape forever.

Very well put together documentary and reminder how quickly things can change. No matter where we are at, it happens everywhere

My dad told me about this he had been working on the superstack at the time but was not working the day the tornado happened.

Great People in Lively and Sudbury. Go Wolves! :)

I remember my mom telling me out this! She lived in valley east at the time. She remembered driving thru the damage after.

Well done. Excellent documentary. Devastating of course.Nature we forget its power.

I came to Canada as a refugee in 2017. Moved to Sudbury last year. I'm pleased to be among this wonderful society. Sudburians, you are awesome.

Cool story!!! Didn't even know Sudbury had this deadly touchdown. Great old school footage...wow can't even imagine being in a home that was tossed by a tornado!!

WOW! The unexpected power of nature. Four minutes must've felt like an eternity. Doug, thank you for sharing this documentary, well done and reminds us to live each day to the fullest and always respect nature. 🌲

Well done! Great video. Mother Nature can not be underestimated.

Very well done....I was just up in the Lively area this past week and my siblings and I were talking exactly about this tornado. There was one house up on 11th Avenue that was picked up turned 180 degrees and dropped back down on its foundation with in 9 inches. The only person killed that I am aware of in Lively was a gentleman not far from that house that had a trailer or a camper back drop down on top of him or he was inside of....that would have be on Tenth Ave and 'C' Street.

I worked Ambulances in that decade. There were 1,025 calls in a 24hr period and seven deaths in Sudbury and Field Ontario. Ambulances came from ElliotLake, Owen Sound, Burks Falls North Bay and Haileybury for calls in the Sudbury area and all of West Nippissing.

We lived in Long Lake, and I was 13 years old. I remember the weird yellow sky, not a "sunny" yellow, but a murky, dirty yellow, the wind, the trees doing more than just swaying, and watching a picnic table go flying past our living room window (yes, I was actually standing looking out of our picture window, no one knew what was going on). The picnic table once resided in a neighbors yard way down at the other end of the road. Never knew where it eventually landed. 6 people died and hundreds were injured. Thankfully only a few shingles on our roof went for a ride. Glad Tidings church on Regent Street (opposite old Memorial Hospital) was so badly hit, for awhile we all thought it would completely slide down the hill into the gully below.

Wow, what a story that was. Great narrative and a fascinating insight into weather systems that turn sour. Very honorable coverage 🙏😇

Very interesting. This happened one month before I was born. We don't get many tornados where I live here in the United States, a few come through but because I live in a very hilly part of the country, they die out before traveling too far. We do however have several micro bursts every year, they can do some heavy damage but again, they're very isolated to small areas. Thanks for sharing my friend.

This is an excellent documentary guys, always amazes me how powerful these are. In 2010 MN had 48 tornadoes in one day, including 4 F3s and 3 F4s. The damage these things do is unthinkable.

I was 9 when this happened. I lived in Espanola which is 45 minutes west of Sudbury. I remember going to school after and the teacher had a pile of newspapers for us to read the story about the tornado. Once we had read all the newspaper stories she asked us to write a short essay. We had read where the men on top of the stack had been trying to decide if they should jump or hang on. We were to write what we would have done. It wasn't graded, we read our answers out loud and to this day I will never forget the bravery of the men on that stack. I don't remember what I wrote. They are talking of tearing that stack down, maybe they should just modify it, put a pipe up the center. It is a monument to the people who survived that tornado.

A very good story. I remember that day too even though I lived in Falconbridge. I was 14 at the time and I remember staring out through a window looking east towards 5 shaft as the sound of the wind grew louder and the clouds turned greenish black. The wind and rain that came down in our town that day was strangely amazing and horrifying at the same time. No roofs were lost but there were a number of shingles came off of roofs and the insulbrick panels off the sides of homes. The damage went east to almost as far as Markstay. You could see where the twister jumped hwy 17 in many places - long narrow swathes of torn up trees. We have a camp on the West Arm and we drove past that area every weekend. I remember the stories of the workers that were up in the metal framework pouring concrete for the Superstack. If they hadn't been wearing their harnesses, all of them would been blown off the top of the structure. I remember all those sites, the blown out wall of the church that was on the side of the hill near Memorial Hospital. The scenes of the homes in Lively - you could see the damage from the Hwy 17 entrance to the town. My Dad drove us through all this after it was safe to do so. He said it looked like something out of WWII. Strangely enough, the Big Nickel was unscathed even though it was in the path of the storm. It jumped in a few spots as it went over Laurentian University and landed again in the eastern part of the city - on it's way to the Markstay area.

This was incredible. Tornadoes can come out of nowhere. I have a friend that a tornado picked him up and dropped him off in a creek. Besides some cuts and bruises he was ok. Really enjoyed watching this guys. 👍👍.

I lived on Oliver Street in Copper Cliff and my husband was on his way home from night shift at 8:30 am. I was poking my head out the window because the wind was so fierce. It was blowing mini tornados of dirt and leaves up the street and I hoped my husband would be ok coming home. When he arrived, he said it was a tornado and trees were being uprooted and stuff was blowing all over the place. My father in law drove out to see us and said that his dog hid in the back seat all the way out to Copper Cliff. He used to own Boulton’s Furniture on the Kingsway but it was untouched. The storm was just passing through Copper Cliff to Lively. That was a once in a lifetime experience I hope never happens again!

I remember that now. No one is safe even underground folks have been pulled out. Good post Doug.

Great Job Doug. Very informative and well done.

How's she goin'? Great job on this video guys!!! I'm glad you referred to it as a film, because it's way ahead of just a video that's for sure!!! Terrible and tragic are words that come to mind but really I just watch with my mouth open. Thanks for posting and stay safe!!!

I was 8 and the devastation I saw still haunts me today.....Wow

It doesn't discriminate does it Doug/Jamie? A bit like our big flood over here this year it just hit everything. A very good documentary guys. The dark storm Jamie's parents experienced must have been super spooky. Take care over there. Mark

awesomely done guys☺ herd lots of stories about that storm..like a sheet of plywood flew threw someone's roof like a ninja star😮 crazy!

Really interesting video, really well put together, I didn't realize Canada had tornadoes like that, whole houses being blown about, scary stuff!! All the best 👍

Thanks for sharing.. Mother Nature can be so destructive.. We can only try to be prepared best way we can.. Full View and Like..

Thanks for doing this.

i never forgot that day. We had a hockey game in Copper Cliff and the lights went out in the arena...it was pitch black

Stay safe my friends

I remember this day very well. I was 10 years old, living in a townhouse in Copper Cliff. My grandparents were visiting from the Netherlands and were supposed to fly back to Amsterdam that day, but their flights were canceled,due to the storm. We were living in a new townhouse and the force of the winds was forcing rain through the window frames like we were living in a cardboard box! My mother and grandparents were busy trying to sop up the water pouring into the house with every towel in the house. I watched our Ford Maverick rocking in the driveway sure that it would flip over with the next gust. My father worked for Inco and was one of the designers of the SuperStack. I remember him saying that the cars in the parking lot at Inco suffered so much damage from flying debris. Friends of ours lost the top story of their house while they huddled downstairs with their four children. I believe this might be the family in the news broadcast above. I remember that they rented a townhouse in our neighborhood in Copper Cliff, while their house was being rebuilt. This memory is burned into my mind like it happened yesterday. I hope to never experience a close call like that again!

wow i like probably so many would think you guys would not have such things i know we have them where i live and sometimes they are quite destructive but nothing like this! that i know of!

My dad told me this story, happened when he was a teenager in the West End on Maple St... He said all of a sudden it went from sunny outside to practically black as night, and from the basement cellar it sounded like a train was derailing above his head. The worst of it was no more than a minute but it felt like forever.

Hello Doug, I don't know what's going on with the weather pattern around the world, we've had two Tornado's here in Victoria in the last two weeks, no deaths thank God But they uprooted trees and farm shedding was destroyed, the second one that happened last week destroyed a school but luckily there's no kids attending school with the Covid lockdown, the school was destroyed along with some local houses, Thanks for sharing mate ATB Jim, stay safe

I appreciate the time and care you took with this documentary. Tornadoes are common here, but one does not think of them occurring elsewhere. The loss of life was tragic

Massive damage Doug mate terrible thing to happen good to show what can happen good upload brother 👍👌😀

Those things are terrible. We had one come through town where I grew up once. It hit more in town so we really didn't even know anything about it out in the country where we lived, but driving to church later that day we could see a path through the trees where that thing had gone and just twisted and snapped every tree off in a line. Never saw anything like that until then.

Nature is one of the most powerful sources known even more so than any man made bomb...... Simply amazing how it can transform an area..... Like others have said I've never heard of a tornado in Canada...... Nice edit.....

Yeah, we get storms in the UK but nothing like that, such destructive power and the devastation these thing leave behind , is so sad, as it leaves not only damage to property but death as well - terrifying. Cheers Alan

I am all too familiar with that scenario living here in Iowa Nicely done Doug 👍

Well done guys

Well done

I was born in 1973 but my Mum was pregnant with my sister and working at the Copper Cliff Hospital as a Registered Nurse. She has told me stories of working the Day Shift that day and of the injury’s that came in. Truly horrific.........

The house across the street from mine the roof was blown off (I wasn’t born though yet)

I recall that day like it was yesterday. I was ten years old then and living in a small bungalow on the south portion of the town. I remember just having finished breakfast and sitting in front of the television when we noticed how dark it was getting. My plan for that day was to venture over to my best friend's house, which was on the eastern side of the town, and not knowing then, the flight path of that tornado. The wind was starting pick up heavily and the skies became ever darker. I remember how black it became! Something that you would expect from an apocalypse. My mom was freaking out a bit, but to this ten year old, it wasn't too much of a concern not thinking about the ramifications. Needless to say, the maple trees in our front yard started to bend, and even more so the winds whipped up as they became more violent. Then the rain started, and it was teeming down the street to the point where it looked like a small river. It was crazy! And within five minutes, it was done. The sun came out a short while later. Luckily, nothing happened to our place following that storm. I'll never forget hopping on my bike and making my way over to my friend's house, and witnessing a scene of what looked like a bomb had gone off. There was debris everywhere. Because I took a short-cut, I missed seeing some of the houses off their foundations, but when I got to my friend's house, which backed onto the local golf course, I saw trailers, boats, shrapnel of wood and other objects strewn all over the fairways of golf course. I went into my friend's house and the babysitter, who was franticly crying, was being consoled by my friend's mom because it just so happened that she was walking on her way over to the house to babysit when she got caught in the storm. I recall her saying that she grabbed onto a pole in the school yard to prevent her from being swept away by the high winds. That would be an experience to tell the kids some day! Yeah...this is not something you would expect in a place called Lively in northern Ontario, and not known to be located in Tornado Alley. But it certainly changed a lot of lives that day. Thanks for creating and sharing this story. I didn't think that there was any archived footage of it? Cheers!

I lived in Lively my friends house was tured around half .Crouse was his last name Another friend landed in his back yard in his bed No electricity for 4-6 weeks .salvation army lots of things .lots of downed trees.🇨🇦😎😎🇨🇦

Good luck 👍🌷💕🎁

I was 6 years old when it hit,

Thanks for posting this. Greatly appreciate seeing something other than political or COVID vids and agenda driven news. Subbed. Props to the creator of the vid.. they obviously put a lot of work into it and it's well done.

Who were the six workers on the super stack? Any with the last name Young ?

My grandfather and my wife's uncle were on the stack at the time. Apparently it was a little windy.

That's true central alberta doesn't get many tornados. Just nasty storms!

My father-in-law knew one of the workers on the stack, he told me one of them was so scared he wanted to jump off the scaffold the other guys had to pin him down.

My grandpa was on the super stack when the tornado hit

Horrible damage. I would never associate Ontario and Quebec with tornadoes.

We were on our first holiday, having got there by 3pm. My husband told me.At the time I had just begun my second pregnancy and was very sluggish and not feeling very good 😌. We threw everything in the car and began driving to Lively.There was no hwy 144,so we had to go the long way around by Chapleau. Roger being a Geography Teacher 👨‍🏫 understood the reason why we needed to get home as fast as we could.All News stations indicated no Lively;thus I cried trying to make our 4yr old feel ok. Police 👮‍♀️ stopped us because of our speed..We had to drive through Field Ontario;that’s where the devastated their town. I cried more. copper Cliff came ..because of the many sightseers we could only literally crawl home.All was black,no Hydro. I thought like the news no Lively!!Then we. Saw our tattered house. It was standing! I had a home! There were both sets of Parents! They had emptied our freezer and fridge and taken it to their house 🏠 . We had lost part of our roof and big picture window in the living room( that is where Michelle would have been playing. Our trip was a God Send! Everyone in Lively became one Family. We ate together at the church from food delivered from Sudbury. Everyone became the Lively Family. I remember August 20 th every yr.

I knew one of the guys on the top of super stack

Thanks for doing this, Doug. I went to high school in Lively in 1972 and heard stories. One guy was at his camp and saw the sky go dark on the far side of the lake. In a couple minutes it had spread across the lake and he was in total darkness like it was midnight. He said it was dead silent then he heard the wind slowly start and build until it was at tornado level. He came through unscathed. When he went to his home he found three large shards of glass stuck in his bed. One of my classmates had broken his back in the tornado and recovered. In gym class he backed into a wall while playing volleyball and broke it again. At the time we were told he would be in a wheelchair permanently. Very sad.

On his way to work at the smelter my father went in a store to buy smokes and came out to night sky. Rumor has it they were building the super stack at the time and one man panicked and tried to jump off but his coworkers held him down. Who knows...

My great grandpa is in this video his is the one in the blue shirt and was a cop

When u live in Sudbury butttt u weren't born when it happened