The National Weather Service has confirmed that some of the damage left by severe storms across central and northern Minnesota on Wednesday evening, June 12 was caused by tornadoes.

Severe storms flipped a camper along State Highway 6 near Rabbit Lake north of Crosby on Wednesday night. The National Weather Service says the damage was caused by a tornado. (Kirsti Marohn / MPR News)

Meteorologists are still working to determine exactly how many tornadoes touched down and how strong they were.

Wednesday’s storms left extensive damage to trees and power lines, flipped boats and campers and damaged some buildings — with the Brainerd Lakes region particularly hard-hit. There were no reports of serious injuries.

The Weather Service office in Duluth sent storm survey teams Thursday to the Brainerd Lakes area, as well as east into parts of Aitkin and Carlton counties.

Those teams confirmed tornado damage at:

Rabbit Lake along State Highway 6 north of Crosby
Clamshell Lake near Crosslake
Cedar and Hammal lakes in western Aitkin County

“The NWS has not yet determined if the damage in Crow Wing County and Aitkin County is all from a single continuous tornado or if there were several tornadoes. Due to the rural and forested landscape, not all parts of the damage path were immediately accessible by ground,” the Weather Service reported in an update Thursday evening.

The agency is working to get aerial imagery to further assess the damage, and determine the path and strength of the tornado or tornadoes.

Storm survey crews also confirmed a weak tornado tracked for about 5 miles near Wright in Carlton County.

Wednesday night’s storms also caused significant damage in areas from St. Cloud and Sartell north toward Little Falls and Camp Ripley.

Residents and utility crews will continue working on storm cleanup on Friday. As of Friday morning, only a few dozen homes and businesses across central and northern Minnesota remained without power — down from more than 15,000 in the immediate aftermath of the storms.

Crow Wing Power reported that its crews had to replace more than 16 broken utility poles, in addition to damage to power lines.

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