A possible tornado tore through Atlantic Beach on Long Island Thursday night, ripping apart roughly 30 one-story cabanas at Sun & Surf Beach Club and prompting Nassau County to declare a state of emergency. Despite the destruction, only one worker was injured, and that person refused medical attention.
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said a tornado touched down in Atlantic Beach and announced that a state of emergency had been declared for the county, according to ABC7 New York. The county activated its emergency operations center in response, and Blakeman said he would provide an update on the county's emergency response Friday morning. The National Weather Service, however, has not confirmed that a tornado actually touched down in Atlantic Beach and said it would survey the area before making a determination — a process that typically involves analyzing damage patterns to estimate wind speeds under the Enhanced Fujita Scale, which weighs 28 separate damage indicators before a rating is issued.
The Inwood Fire Department received a call at 7:15 p.m. Thursday for severe wind damage at Sun & Surf Beach Club, and first responders discovered around 30 cabanas damaged or destroyed, per Nassau County Chief Fire Marshal Michael Uttaro. No first responders were injured, and no other civilians beyond the single worker were hurt in the incident.
A Near Miss for a Crowded Beach Club
Inwood Fire Department Chief Josiyah Green said approximately 100 workers and guests were at Sun & Surf Beach Club when the storm struck, calling it the “grace of luck” that no one was trapped or seriously hurt in the wrecked cabanas, according to Newsday. Video captured what appeared to be a waterspout forming off the South Shore of Long Island before the storm came ashore. Following the storm, management for both Sun & Surf Beach Club and the neighboring Silver Point Beach Club announced temporary closures of both facilities until safety assessments and structural inspections could be completed, the station's report notes.
Reports indicate the storm system was more extensive than a single touchdown. As reported by Readers.id, two separate tornadoes moved onshore as waterspouts in Queens and Nassau County between 6:30 and 7 p.m. Thursday, with the first making landfall in the Eastern Rockaways section of Queens roughly half an hour before the second struck Atlantic Beach.
Flash Flooding Compounded the Damage
Wind wasn't the only hazard. A flash flood warning was issued for the South Shore of Nassau County Thursday as rainfall rates reached 1 to 3 inches per hour, with localized totals climbing between 3 and 5 inches, causing flooding severe enough to submerge vehicles, per the Greater Long Island report. The disruption extended well beyond Nassau County. The broader storm system forced the closure of the Long Island Expressway in Queens in both directions due to flooding and prompted emergency crews in Jersey City, New Jersey, to rescue 69 people stranded in flooded cars, according to WKMG.
How Rare Is a Nassau County Tornado?
Whatever the National Weather Service ultimately determines, tornado touchdowns in Nassau County are historically uncommon. Official NOAA storm records show only 10 confirmed tornadoes in the county between 1680 and 2025, according to TornadoPath. The last notable multi-tornado outbreak on Long Island came on November 13, 2021, when six confirmed EF-0 and EF-1 tornadoes touched down across Nassau and Suffolk counties within a two-hour span, per the National Weather Service.
Nassau County's emergency declaration draws on authority under New York Executive Law § 24, which allows local chief executives to proclaim a local state of emergency for up to 30 days and issue orders such as curfews, traffic prohibitions, and area closures when public safety is imperiled. Atlantic Beach's oceanfront clubs have faced this kind of threat before. Silver Point Beach Club, which has operated on more than 100 acres since the late 1930s, and Sun & Surf Beach Club both suffered widespread structural destruction and multi-foot flooding during Hurricane Sandy in October 2012, according to the LI Herald.
