8 extreme Pennsylvania weather events that were caught on tape
From tornadoes to blizzards, watch the wild Pennsylvania weather events that were captured on film.
Pennsylvania may not sit in Tornado Alley or along the earthquake-prone Pacific Ring of Fire, but the commonwealth has still seen its fair share of extreme weather. From historic floods to devastating blizzards, Pennsylvanians are all too familiar with the wrath of Mother Nature.
While some of the worst weather disasters in state history predate the smartphone, quick-thinking locals with cameras in their pockets (or camcorders on their shoulders) have captured alarming footage in recent decades. We’ve rounded up some of the most intense weather events caught on tape right here in Pennsylvania. And unfortunately, with climate change fueling increasingly extreme conditions, these likely won’t be the last videos to show just what nature can do.
1972 Hurricane Agnes
When it hit Pennsylvania in 1972, Hurricane Agnes became the costliest natural disaster in state history, causing more than $2 billion in damage statewide. The storm flooded entire cities and killed more than 50 people. Though the storm was more than 50 years ago, archival news footage shows some of the floodwaters and rescues of survivors by boat. You can see some of the destruction in a video from Harrisburg’s WHTM-TV. And in the Wilkes-Barre area, an amateur videographer captured footage of the storm and its aftermath on home video.
1985 western Pennsylvania tornado outbreak
Over the course of just nine hours on a single day in 1985, 44 tornadoes tore through areas surrounding Lakes Erie and Ontario in both the United States and Canada. In western Pennsylvania alone, at least 21 twisters touched down, forming the worst tornado outbreak in state history. The strongest tornado—the only F5 tornado ever recorded in Pennsylvania—formed in eastern Ohio and ripped a path across the state line to western Mercer County, killing 18 people and leveling hundreds of buildings along the way. Last year, Pittsburgh’s KDKA-TV aired a retrospective marking 40 years since the tornado outbreak. Viewers can see brief footage of some of the tornadoes, but mostly the video covers the destruction that took dozens of lives and razed communities to the ground.
Blizzard of 1993
We may have had multiple “storm of the century” weather events hit in the past couple of decades, but the first to get the label in Pennsylvania was the Blizzard of 1993, which pummeled the eastern U.S. with feet of snow. Record freezing temperatures caused snow to fall as far south as Florida, and some areas in Pennsylvania experienced more than two feet of powder, as well as harrowing whiteout conditions, thundersnow, and widespread power outages. WGAL-TV in the Susquehanna Valley recently shared archival footage of the storm, showing how it buried cars and city streets under snow.
Harrisburg’s Walnut Street Bridge collapses after the Blizzard of 1996
Nearly 30 years ago, snowmelt floodwater and ice floes from the Blizzard of 1996 slammed into the Walnut Street Bridge in Harrisburg, causing parts of the western span of the bridge to collapse into the Susquehanna River. The river then swept those portions of the bridge away until it hit the Market Street Bridge and crumpled into the water. An amateur videographer caught the bridge collapse, as well as the destroyed bridge’s short journey downriver, on tape. The western span of the bridge was never rebuilt, but the eastern span remains, connecting pedestrians and cyclists from downtown Harrisburg to City Island.
2021 Bucks County tornado
In July 2021, a tornado outbreak struck Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic, producing a powerful tornado in the Trevose and Bensalem Township area of Bucks County. Rated an EF-3 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, the tornado had estimated peak winds of 140 miles per hour. Employees at a car dealership took a video of the storm from inside the dealership, documenting flying debris and building damage. Thankfully, the employees only suffered minor injuries.
2023 southeastern Pennsylvania floods
Unfortunately, flooding is becoming more common in Pennsylvania, especially in the southeastern region, as rainfall becomes more frequent and severe. In July 2023, historic rainfall led to severe flash floods in the southeastern part of the state. In Berks County, residents saw up to 8 inches of rain over a short period of time, and roads turned into rivers. One Reading local captured video of (thankfully unoccupied!) vehicles in the floodwaters. You can hear someone out of the frame say “Brah, I just watched my car just swim away” as a car caught in the flood is pushed down the street.
Just a few days after the Berks County floods, sudden flash floods overtook parts of Bucks County, dropping almost 7 inches of rain in less than 45 minutes and killing seven people. Philadelphia’s WTXF-TV shared flood footage and interviews with survivors. One woman describing being caught in the flood recalled, “All of a sudden, 3 inches of water, 4 inches of water—a foot of water—just coming at us.”
2024 Washington County tornado
The tornado that hit Finleyville in Washington County in 2024 damaged a church and toppled some trees, but otherwise wasn’t one for the history books. Yet if you’ve ever wondered what it looks like when a tornado forms, one local caught the moment on video. You can see the funnel cloud begin to twist before the tornado begins moving through buildings, wreckage flying in its wake.
2025 western and central Pennsylvania derecho
Never heard of a derecho? That was true for many Pennsylvanians until April 29 of this year. The wide, straight-line storms that bring hurricane-force winds and severe rain to areas spanning hundreds of miles are more common in the center of the country. But this spring, a derecho barreled through western Pennsylvania to central Pennsylvania, killing three people, uprooting hundreds of trees, and destroying homes and businesses—all very quickly. While the worst of the storm took minutes, hundreds of thousands of people lost power for days. Watch this timelapse video prepared by KDKA to see how fast the storm overtook Pittsburgh. And as that video was being recorded, a Tiki boat in one of the city’s rivers was fighting to stay afloat, as captured by Pittsburgh’s WTAE-TV.
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