Videos of the media briefiings and storm coverage can be found below.
The National Weather Service confirmed that it was, in fact, a tornado that hit the Churchill Downs stable area on Wednesday night; the aftermath left 6 ½ barns uninhabitable, displacing horses and frazzling nerves but injuring neither human nor equine.
“That to us is miraculous when you see the damage we’ve got on the backside,” Churchill Vice President of Communications John Asher said Thursday morning.
Initial reports from Churchill indicated that some horses were loose in the stable area while collapsing structures pinned others down, but all found homes overnight. Some relocated to the nearby state fairgrounds. Keeneland Association in Lexington offered stall space, and a fleet of Salee vans were on standby.
”Racing’s a big family; you never appreciate it more than at a time like this,” Asher said.
Barns 5, 23, 24, 26, 28, 40, and the east end of 21 are uninhabitable, and their former inhabitants have either moved to other barns at the Louisville track or to other locations. Trainers Carl Bowman (barn 24) and Rusty Arnold (barn 28) both shipped their horses to Keeneland. Ian Wilkes (barn 26) kept some horses at Churchill and shipped 20 others to Skylight Training Center in Goshen, Kentucky.
Churchill cancelled training, live racing, and simulcasting for Thursday but no decision has been made regarding Friday activities, including the popular Downs After Dark night racing program with a scheduled post time of 6 p.m.
Track President Kevin Flanery said he is “optimistic” that Churchill would race on Friday.
“[We] have to identify where horses are for Friday's races to make sure can race,” Flanery said. “Some horses will be off the property, [and we] need to see where horses that normally would ship in on day of race can go.”
Churchill Vice President of Operations David Sweazy said that civil engineers and architects will evaluate the barn area to assess total damage there but reiterated that there was no damage to the historic grandstand, which is a registered National Historic Landmark.
“The frontside has sustained no damage at all: not a blade of grass has been bent over,” Sweazy said. “We have done a complete assessment.”
Meteorologist Joe Sullivan said that the NWS would classify the tornado as either an F0 (winds up to 72 miles/hour) or an F1 (winds up to 112 miles/hour) on the Fujita Scale.
For WLKY coverage of the storm aftermath, click here.
Wind Damaged Several Barns at Churchill Downs
Wednesday Night, Including Steve Margolis' Barn
Reed Palmer/Churchill Downs photo
Damaged power lines block the streets around the Cardinal
Stadium at the University of Louisville in Louisville, Ky.
Photo: AP
People view damage to Barn 23 in the stable area of Churchill Downs
after a tornado hit the race track Wednesday night., in this view from
Thursday, June 23, 2011. The National Weather Service sent teams out
Thursday to determine whether the funnel cloud reported in the area
was the cause of the damage. (AP Photo/Garry Jones)
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