A mobile home park in Oxnard was hit by an extreme wind event that meteorologists were describing as a “possible weak tornado,” which tore roofs off homes and ripped power cables to the ground Thursday afternoon, authorities said.
The damage took place while wide swaths of Ventura and Los Angeles counties were under flash flood and severe thunderstorm warnings amid a powerful atmospheric river storm.
The Ocean-Aire Mobile Home Estates in Oxnard was hit by fearsome 60-mph wind gusts shortly after 3:30 p.m., according to the National Weather Service. Around a dozen properties were damaged as well as carports, awnings and power lines.
The park is at 2250 Butler Road, near Oxnard Boulevard and Pleasant Valley Road, and provides a valuable source of affordable housing for families and seniors.
No injuries were reported at the park, but the area remained without electricity around 6 p.m., according to reporting from the Ventura County Star.
Meteorologist Carol Smith said the weather service intended to assess the damage Friday and determine whether there was indeed a weak tornado at the park.
She said this was probably what happened based on the weather patterns seen on radar and the fact that roofs were ripped off buildings, which typically doesn’t happen from strong winds alone.
“Sometimes when you have really strong [wind] uplift and there’s strong thunderstorms or a collection of storms, you can get this [wind] rotation,” she said, describing how the tornado may have formed.
The weather service had warned about the possibility of tornadoes when issuing a severe thunderstorm warning for L.A. County on Thursday afternoon.
Mobile home parks have been hard hit during the extreme weather events Southern California has experienced this year.
More than 300 mobile homes were destroyed in the Palisades fire in January, which wiped out a rare pocket of affordable housing by the beach in Pacific Palisades.
Many former residents of the Palisades Bowl Mobile Estates and Tahitian Terrace mobile home park are now struggling to find housing within their budgets.
