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Storm update: Preliminary findings confirm tornado in Elmira

After Thursday's severe thunderstorms, thousands in the Southern Tier and Mid-Hudson regions continue to recover from the heavy winds. The National Weather Service says a tornado caused some of the damage.

As of Friday afternoon, more than 13,000 NYSEG customers in Chemung County were without electricity. To help in the effort to restore electricity, extra crews were brought in from Canada to help local crews dealing with thousands of fallen trees.

So far there are no reports of injuries and only one house in Elmira has been condemned.

Preliminary findings from a crew sent out by the National Weather Service confirmed that a tornado with 105 to 110 mile per hour winds touched down in Elmira. Tornadoes are rare in New York state but as many as four,  usually small in size, are typical in any given year.

Matt Richmond comes to Binghamton's WSKG, a WRVO partner station in the Innovation Trail consortium, from South Sudan, where he worked as a stringer for Bloomberg, and freelanced for Radio France International, Voice of America, and German Press Agency dpa. He has worked with KQED in Los Angeles, Cape Times in Cape Town, South Africa, and served in the Peace Corps in Cameroon. Matt's masters in journalism is from the Annenberg School for Communication at USC.