Unforgiving Goderich tornado kills one miner

It may take years to rebuild Goderich, Ont., after a severe tornado ripped through the picturesque town on the eastern shore of Lake Huron, leaving one dead, 37 injured, and massive damage. 

Ontario Provincial Police confirmed that sixty-one-year-old Norman Laberge, a resident of Lucknow, Ont., died in the storm on Sunday, Aug. 21, while working at the Sifto salt mine in Goderich. The mine is owned by Kansas City-based Compass Minerals (CMP-N).

“I am very sad to report that a valued, 30-year employee perished in the storm. Our thoughts are with his family and friends today,” stated company’s president and CEO, Angelo Brisimitzakis, in a press release the next day. The cause of death has not been released.

On Aug. 23, Laberge’s wife Brenda Turcotte told the CBC that she wanted to know why her husband of two years was the only employee killed during the storm. The news agency said Laberge’s family is still waiting for answers from the company or town officials.

Goderich’s chief administrative officer Larry McCabe says he has no comments on the fatality. “But it is certainly unfortunate,” he notes.

Operations at the world’s largest rock salt mine, Sifto, have been halted as Compass determines the operational and financial effects of the storm.

The mine’s surface structures and evaporation plant both “sustained significant damage,” the company outlined in a press release. It added that no damage was done to the underground operations.

Sifto has a production capacity of 9 million tons, while the evaporation plant can churn out 175,000 tons of high-purity salt.

Compass, which is the town’s largest employer with about 350 workers, said it will hold off operations until repairs are made.

Similarly, many local businesses were affected by the twister, which struck the downtown core before rolling into residential neighbourhoods, demolishing homes, flattening cars and uprooting trees, with winds of 280 km per hour and a path of destruction 500-metres wide.

“I can’t believe the mess we are in,” says Jillian Gerrard, a resident of Goderich. “I fear for the survival of this pretty town – 80% of our businesses were affected.”

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has pledged $5 million from the provincial government’s coffers to help rebuild the port town of 8,000.

Based on the extensive damage, Environment Canada ranked the tornado as a Fujita Scale 3, or F3, and said it was the worse storm in Ontario since 1996. The agency noted that less than 5% of tornados in Canada are categorized as F3 or higher. 

McCabe says it may take a while to get the town back on its feet. 

 “The devastation is so great. It won’t be a six-month process, it will be a multi-year process to build the municipality.”