One thousand four hundred and forty-two. That’s how many tornadoes have ripped through spots in the US this year. 

Seven have hit New York State so far. 

The one that hit Sullivan County on Thursday felt – to borrow from beloved Yankee Yogi Berra – “like deja vu all over again.” 

For the second time in two years, those of us in Callicoon Center heard a sudden shrieking from our cellphones warning us to take cover, to move away from the windows and outside walls.

This time, we knew what could happen. 

The damage left behind by the April 2023 tornado that ripped through town has forever changed the landscape of our town. The wind whips across the hilltops freely now, the swaths of trees that used to stop them stood for more than 100 years only to be toppled in the blink of an eye. 

We know the threat is real. 

We just didn’t expect it to happen again so soon. 

To people living in the center of the U.S., this attitude may seem naive at best, stupid at worst. But who could blame us?

We’re in NY! It’s the home of pizza and bagels, apples and maple syrup. If people talk about our weather, it’s almost certainly going to be about the snow. Maybe the blistering heat of a midsummer day in Manhattan will get a mention. 

No one is talking about the 547 tornadoes that hit the entire state between 1952 and 2024. No one was talking about the years when there was just one tornado in the Empire State. 

Growing up in Western Sullivan County, tornadoes were the last thing on my mind. We worried about snow and ice storms in the winter, about flooding all year long (one of the worst to hit Callicoon came during a rare January thaw).

Looking through our county’s severe weather history, a few twisters pop up in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, but not many. An EF2 hit Swan Lake in 1972, and EF1s have touched down in Monticello in 1998, Aden in 2003, and outside Parksville in 2014.  

I have faint memories of the EF1 (on a scale of EF0 being the weakest and EF5 the strongest) that left behind $250,000 in damage in Callicoon in the fall of 1990 (about $618,000 in 2025 dollars), but I’m not old enough to remember the EF2 that hit the Liberty area in 1961. 

That storm injured four people and left behind $2.5 million in damages (approximately $27 million in 2025 dollars). 

Never before, however, has a tornado hit twice in the same hamlet in Sullivan County. It’s a dubious honor for our tiny corner of the world and one I can assure you on behalf of my fellow Callicoon Center residents and my own family is not a claim to fame we relish. 

We take tornadoes seriously here. We know to expect the unexpected.