Tornado Dumps Cabin, Pair In Lake

At age 67, Robert Howard has seen most everything. That is, until a tornado surprised he and a friend, picking up the cottage they were in and dumping the pair - and house - into a nearby lake.

Howard, his face a road map of cuts and bandages, was in a cottage that was lifted off its foundations and tossed in a lake by a tornado that touched down on the shores of Williams Lake, about 19 miles south of Owen Sound.

“There was a hell of a bang, and I can remember saying, ‘Where in the hell did all this water come from,’ Howard said Saturday from his hospital bed. “Of course I found out later it was the lake.”

Howard, of Lakefield, Ontario, and Ken Osborne, 59, of London, Ontario, were hospitalized in fair condition this weekend in Owen Sound, northwest of Toronto on the shores of Lake Huron’s Georgian Bay.

Senior provincial police Const. Terry Bell said Saturday it was “truly unbelievable” that the men survived.

Howard didn’t dispute that.