The winds of change blew across the GTA on Thursday, and they caused a lot of havoc across the city.
After enduring almost 24 hours of
steady and sometimes flooding rain, a cold front breezed in overnight and turned attention from water to wobble, as intense breezes gusting up to 90 kilometres an hour presented new problems province-wide.
On
Lawnside Dr. in the Jane and Wilson area, a large pine tree came tumbling down in the wind, damaging two cars that were sitting underneath it (top left).
Homeowner Eugenio Commodari was about to got out to a local mall when he discovered his transportation was flattened. "I was inside the house. I have a coffee," he recalls. "And I called my friend. I said let's go to Yorkdale ... When I opened the door I saw the tree on top of the house. Nobody believed me. I say everybody start to laughing (sic). So when they came out, it was a surprise."
But it was no joke to those affected. The tree took out the back window of one of the vehicles and it sat with a quickly improvised plastic cover on it, flapping in the breeze.
Commodari was angry because he'd asked the city to allow him to cut down the tree but officials refused. (Toronto has a bylaw that prevents tree cutting without authorization.
See more on that here.) "I was trying to cut it before something happened because I can see it swinging. The city says you cannot cut it because it's very healthy."
It cost him $1,800 to get the fallen debris removed - not to mention repairs to the damaged cars. "The window is broken," he laments. "The trunk is on top of the hood."
He intends to replant but will opt for a fruit tree instead of a pine.
But he wasn't alone in his wind-driven woes.
On the same street, a stone archway blew over onto a driveway, leaving cement and shingles scattered everywhere (below).
More tree limbs came down in Rosedale and in the Jane and Highway 400 area.
Toronto will take care of the problem - but only if the broken branches are on city property. If a tree on your land falls on your home or driveway, you're on the hook for the clean-up. Call
(416) 338-TREE (8733) to find out more.
At
Eglinton and Avenue Road, a restaurant sign blew off its base and dangled over the pavement.
And it was garbage day in many parts of the GTA and the bins used to store the refuse and recycling blew all over the road, leaving bags, boxes and papers everywhere.
Most of the province was under a wind warning for the day, and it hit the GTA like a mini-tornado around
10am
, when sustained winds were clocked at 60 km/h and gusted up to 90.
That was enough to cause power outages and one is believed to have taken place in the
downtown financial district, affecting more than 120,000 people in five buildings.
All this presages the return of winter to the city, after days of above normal temperatures.
Wind chills will make the night air feel closer to -5.
The good news is that although it will feel more like winter again, there's a long and uninterrupted period of sunshine ahead, stretching well into next week.
Highs will stay at or below the freezing mark right through the long weekend and into Tuesday and there's almost no chance of snow until Wednesday - when we could be hit with yet another big storm.
Check the 7-Day forecast
Check the current conditions in your area
See the latest updated weather webcast