Despite some reports suggesting a small tornado was responsible for the damage on the Notre Dame campus yesterday, the official line from the university is that the culprit was simply “high, straight-line winds.” From the ND press release:

There is no evidence that a tornado touched down on University property, according to Notre Dame officials who were on campus when the storm hit.

(Hat tip: Domer Connect.) As I said yesterday, I thought it was straight-line winds based on the nature of the damage — all the trees seemed to fall in the same direction, whereas in a tornado, you would expect to see them fall in all different directions. On the other hand, it’s unusual that the damage was confined to such a narrow area, basically in a straight line from the Grotto to Hesburgh Library, with the rest of campus virtually unaffected. Also, it’s surprising to me that a spire from the Basillica could be toppled by mere straight-line winds; a funnel cloud knocking a piece of debris into it at high speed would make more sense. But in light of the nature of the damage that I saw, I still think the straight-line-wind explanation is probably correct.

I’m still working on getting my photos and videos online (sorry for the delay, but it’s hard to find free time between all the 3L Week social activities — for example, I’ll be leaving in about an hour for the “booze cruise” on Lake Michigan), but for now, here are some photos by another student… and ND Nation also has pictures. And here’s some video taken by an ND Nation poster:

Here’s another video… and here are a couple videos of the storm damage set to music.

Some other blogs covering this: bird_style, Rakes of Mallow, Irish Round Table, Lani, Heather, The Kloska Family Blog, City of Steeples and A Texan in Indiana. Also, more ND Nation threads can be found here, here, here and here. And here’s a USA Today article about the damage.