A waterspout formed off the Long Island coast and moved ashore as a small tornado that wreaked havoc on a beach club Thursday evening — damaging cabanas and scattering debris across the sand, insane footage shows.
Harrowing video from East Atlantic Beach, Nassau County, shows the massive spout forming near the shoreline and gradually moving inland, tearing through boardwalk businesses before dissolving shortly after landfall around 6:45 p.m.
The county declared a state of emergency amid the extremely rare weather event.
“A tornado touched down in Nassau County minutes ago in Atlantic Beach,” Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said in a statement, adding that “so far there are no reports of casualties or serious injuries.”
The twister tore through shorefront structures and lifted roofs from beachside cabanas, leaving wood and patio furniture strewn throughout the area.
“There is property damage at Silver Point Beach Club and Sun and Surf that is being assessed right now, and a search team has been mobilized to make sure no one is trapped within the cabanas,” Blakeman said.
Long Beach local Matthew Stark, 28, was at the Sun and Surf Beach Club with a group of nine family members when the storm struck.
The tugboat mate and lifelong member of the beach club said they all had huddled into their wooden cabana to escape the torrential rain when the tornado tore off its roof.
“As I was closing the door to the cabana, you heard and felt the whoosh of the gusts of wind, and it ripped the roof right off, blew all the debris, and stuff just started falling on us — the roof and the beams,” Stark told The Post.
“I’ve never felt or experienced anything like that, kind of surreal. One second, it’s like no big deal. The next second, everything was turned upside down, quite literally.”
He said the destruction left by the twister was like nothing he’s ever seen.
“I’ve never seen carnage like that. It looked like the videos you see in the Midwest of like a tornado ripping through a town,” Stark said. “It was crazy.”
Luckily, he and his relatives walked away largely unscathed.
“Someone was watching out for us for sure,” he said. “After all that, being able to walk away injury-free with nine people…I got a scratch on my finger, a little bump on my head, but yeah, that’s it.”
AccuWeather confirmed that the footage captured in East Atlantic Beach was consistent with a waterspout, which is essentially a tornado that forms over a body of water rather than land.
The National Weather Service told The Post the waterspout “may have come on land” — making it a traditional tornado, but added that an assessment of damage is needed before making an official determination.
Another possible waterspout-turned-tornado touched down in the Rockaways in Queens around the same time, according to NWS.
A tornado warning had been issued for southwestern Nassau County and parts of Queens — specifically Oceanside and Baldwin Harbor — from roughly 6:50 to 7:05 p.m.
Heavy rainfall also created a headache for Long Islanders, including significant travel issues, with reports of a woman trapped in a flooded vehicle on Cherry Valley Avenue and the West Hempstead Turnpike, according to sources.
Additionally, two to three vehicles were stranded on North Central Avenue in Valley Stream beneath the Southern State Parkway, with further reports of motorists trapped on the highway itself.
