NICOLLET, Minn. — The side of his garage was blown out, a tree uprooted onto his mother’s house next door and huge patches of the roof torn off at the Brent Blank’s home a couple of miles south of this central Minnesota town.

“I just got home from work and I watched it because I saw it coming up across the field,” Blank said. “And I saw this twirling, going up and down, and then it came down and I went to the basement.”

Blank said it’s not the first time his home has been hit. He lost a farmhouse to a large storm years ago.

In less than two hours late Wednesday afternoon, south-central Minnesota was slammed with tornadic activity. The National Weather Service received seven reports of tornado sightings at different locations.

It’s been an odd year for tornadoes, in Minnesota specifically, with storms touching down in early March and setting a record for the earliest reported tornadoes in the state. 

Todd Krause, warning coordinator meteorologist for the weather service in Chanhassen, Minnesota, told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune it was “very unusual.” 

“The fact that we’ve never had one this early speaks to just how unusual it is,” he said. 

The August storms, while not unheard of, are unusual as well. 

Some of the seven sightings might have been of the same tornado, according to meteorologist Eric Ahasic. The first tornado reports started just before 5 p.m. near Nicollet. There were sightings one mile east, three miles south and one mile south of the city, Ahasic said.

Just north of the town New Sweden, a tornado toppled a barn, leaving live exposed electrical wires and trapping the homeowners in the nearby house until it was ruled safe, according to the Nicollet County Sheriff’s Department.

Firefighters, police and electrical crews were out on the property, working in the rain to turn off the power.

Ahasic said Wednesday’s turbulent weather was not a total surprise to the National Weather Service in Chanhassen, although the amount of tornadic activity was not predicted.

“We certainly knew heavy rains were on the way for the afternoon,” he said. “We weren’t expecting this many tornadoes. This storm had zero percent hail and zero percent high winds. It definitely was a tricky forecast.”

Staff writers Kristine Goodrich, Brian Arola and Edie Schmierbach contributed to this story.