As tornadoes swept across New Jersey Wednesday, one resident described it as sounding “like a freight train coming through this house.” Cheryl McCormick said her neighbor texted to say she was scared, adding “Wave to me, I’m in the bay window.” But, the next moment, the EF-3 tornado tore through the neighborhood. “She actually was sucked through her house. The next thing she remembered, she was laying between her couch and her coffee table, and her face was full of blood,” McCormick recalled. The woman declined to speak to NJ.com, but McCormick said she was treated at an emergency room for bruises and cuts.

Several tornadoes hit the Northeast this week as Hurricane Ida remnants slammed the region with rain and floods. The EF-3 tornado was only the fifth tornado of that size to hit the New Jersey since 1950, according to the National Weather Service. “You come down now and it’s just all open skies,” McCormick said. “Every tree in our backyard is down.”