North Fort Myers community shaken after tornado hits Tamiami Village

NORTH FORT MYERS, Fla. (WINK) — A tornado touched down in the Tamiami Village community, ripping one home open and damaging others.

The aftermath brought neighbors back to memories of Hurricane Ian. Those who live in the area still can't believe what happened.

The roof of one home is ripped off, with fiberglass hanging out in the open and wooden beams exposed to the sky. One side of the home is buckling in.

This is one of four homes that took a hit when the tornado touched down in the community. WINK News got a look inside the home and found it turned upside down.

Water slowly dripped into the living room. The couch was nowhere to be seen, buried beneath a mountain of collapsed ceiling.

"It opened up like a can of sardines, is what it looked like, man," neighbor Stephen Orthodox said. "Because I just saw the whole thing go just lifting right up."

"There was no warning on this tornado, none at all," former neighbor Louise Candelet said. "It came out of nowhere, came out of nowhere."

The dining room tells the same story. The table was crushed under debris, with only a single chair still peeking through the rubble.

"I don't ever remember having these kinds of storms in the summer," Candelet said. "To have a tornado come in the middle of it, that's something that I never expected. So this is sad. This is really sad."

Outside, the damage is just as hard to miss. Crews spent the day clearing what the storm left behind.

"It just gave me flashbacks of like Hurricane Ian and hurricanes of the past with all this debris," Orthodox said. "This whole park was like that during Ian, so to see this, you know, it's just a heartbreak."

Orthodox lives across the street and says this scene feels all too familiar.

"When Ian went through Total War Zone, through all of the park, not just a few, but this is almost like a reminder of what can happen here in Florida," Candelet said.

Even after hurricanes and now a tornado, people in the community say they aren't ready to leave the place they call home.

"We just pray a lot and hope for the best, and hope that we don't get hit, so we love it here, so we don't want to have to leave," neighbor Jean Pitney said.

The homeowners know their house was hit, but still haven't seen the damage in person. Neighbors say they spend about half the year in Canada and are expected back on Wednesday.