Camera at Jamestown Captures Tornado Sky

By Amber Lester Kennedy Tuesday, April 19, 2011

A couple weeks ago, archaeologist Danny Schmidt did a quick Internet search to look for a weatherproof time-lapse camera. He had an idea he might be able to get some interesting footage of the excavation work at Jamestown Island. He didn’t expect, however, to capture the makings of a tornado.

In a 49-second video of still photos, Schmidt’s camera shows a sunny sky turn blue, purple, sepia, red and back as a tornado swept through the region on Saturday night. At first glance, the footage seems to be taken over several days, but Schmidt says it only shows the pictures taken once every minute from between 7 and 8 p.m. The worst of the storm passed through the Grove area shortly before 7 p.m.

Around 3 p.m. Saturday, a grounds worker at Jamestown Island contacted Schmidt to let him know a tarp protecting the dig was flapping in the wind. The tarp covers the area where archaeologists discovered the perimeter of the church built at Jamestown in 1608. They believe Pocahontas married John Rolfe at the church in 1614.

Schmidt headed out to the site, and decided to bring the time-lapse camera with him. Using a bungee cord, he tied it tightly to one of the reconstructed posts at the fort, aiming its lens at the statue of John Smith that overlooks the James River.

A co-worker who lives in Surry called him later to see if he’d put up the camera, noting the sky was sepia-toned. When he pulled the footage off the camera on Sunday, Schmidt said he was stunned by what he saw. “It didn’t seem real,” he said. “I’m not even sure if that’s from the biggest part of the storm. It was just amazingly lucky to capture one of the most historic storms in the United States from the historic site.”

View the video here: