(VIDEO) Tornado Tears Roofs From Two Dover, Delaware Motels, Prompting State of Emergency and Evacuations Now

DOVER, Del. — A confirmed tornado tore through Dover, Delaware, on Thursday evening, ripping roofs from two motels along North DuPont Highway and downing trees and power lines across the city, prompting Dover's mayor to declare a local state of emergency as officials worked to assess the damage.

The tornado struck around 6:18 p.m., according to a report from a trained storm spotter cited by the National Weather Service, who observed a rain-wrapped tornado on the ground with flying debris near East Division Street close to William Henry Middle School. The state of emergency took effect at 6:20 p.m. and remained active while authorities worked to secure damaged buildings and clear affected roads.

The worst damage occurred along North DuPont Highway near Route 13, where the storm tore into the Days Inn and Super Lodge motels, ripping off sections of their roofs. Both properties were evacuated safely, and no serious injuries were reported anywhere in Dover, according to local authorities.

Guests staying at the two motels described terrifying moments as the storm intensified. Kuimonie Goins, of Greensboro, North Carolina, said she was staying at the Days Inn with her family when conditions rapidly deteriorated. "When it started raining, we started seeing like pieces of buildings flying, and then we started to see the tornado form, and then we ran in the bathroom because we were scared," Goins said. Jiana Hall, of Dover, who was also staying at the hotel, said she immediately moved her children to safety once the danger became apparent. "We immediately grabbed the kids and ran in the bathroom," Hall said, recalling how she tried to reassure the children while the family waited out the storm. "Everything gonna be OK. Praying," she recalled telling them.

Randall Butler, a longtime resident of the Superlodge, said he had no warning the storm would strike his home directly. "I didn't think it was going to hit here. I thought I was going to come home and get some sleep," Butler said. He was forced to find alternative housing following the damage to the property. "It's unbelievable. Thank God I wasn't there," Butler said.

Dover Police Department spokesperson Lt. Mark Hoffman described the scale of the destruction and the fact that no one was seriously hurt as remarkable given the severity of the damage. "Honestly, it's a miracle. I don't know how we made it out of this without anybody being injured," Hoffman said. He also detailed the dangerous conditions facing utility crews working to restore power in the aftermath of the storm. "As you can see there's power lines down, significant damage to poles. We have a roof structure hanging over power lines, so it's creating a dangerous situation for our power crews," Hoffman said.

Dover Police identified the Division Street and Lockerman Street corridor, along with portions of North DuPont Highway, as the hardest-hit areas of the city. In a social media post, the department urged residents to stay off the roads given the scale of the disruption. "We are also dealing with significant power outages and numerous intersections where traffic signals are not functioning, creating extremely dangerous travel conditions. WE NEED EVERYONE TO STAY HOME AND GET OFF THE ROADS," police said.

Resident Julian O'Neill described the unsettling experience of the storm passing through, particularly the sound it produced as it moved through the area. "I never experienced anything like it," O'Neill said. "The craziest part was the sound of it. It was like a whistling sound, almost like a train sound. The rain was so bad and the wind was so bad, you couldn't really see it. All you could see was the trees bending down like crazy."

Beyond the two motels, the tornado caused structural damage at a Kraft Foods facility in the area, according to a second trained storm spotter cited by the National Weather Service. Damage was also reported at the Dover Little League complex on Electric Avenue, where fencing and poles were knocked down and a fallen tree struck the facility's scoreboard. Numerous additional trees and large branches blocked roadways throughout other parts of the city, compounding the disruption to local travel.

DART, Delaware's public transit authority, dispatched vehicles to help relocate residents displaced from the Superlodge, according to Delaware Public Media. The National Weather Service's Mount Holly, New Jersey, office, which covers the Dover area, indicated it would send officials to conduct a formal survey of the damage in the coming days to determine the tornado's strength and confirm the exact path it took through the city. As of this report, no official Enhanced Fujita Scale rating had been assigned to the Dover tornado, and the damage path had not yet been formally surveyed.

Thursday's severe weather extended beyond Dover itself, part of a broader storm system that swept across the mid-Atlantic region. The same system tore the roof off a school building in central Pennsylvania and brought torrential downpours to the Philadelphia suburbs and the Jersey Shore, according to regional coverage of the storm. A separate funnel cloud was also spotted in Egg Harbor Township in South Jersey during the same system. In Pennsylvania, preliminary storm reports documented severe structural damage in the Columbia area, including collapsed walls, a collapsed shed, and shingles torn from multiple roofs, with the National Weather Service's State College office scheduling its own damage survey for Eastern York County and Columbia beginning at 8 a.m. Friday.

Dover's storm system triggered two separate tornado warnings for Kent County on Thursday night, reflecting the sustained and evolving nature of the severe weather threat as it moved through the region. As cleanup efforts continued into Friday, city officials, utility crews and displaced residents faced the task of assessing both the structural damage to the two motels and the broader disruption to power and roadways across Dover, even as police continued urging onlookers to stay away from the affected areas to allow emergency crews room to work safely.