THE BLUE MOUNTAINS - The Blue Mountains has officially been declared a disaster area following the greatest natural disaster since Hurricane Hazel blew through in the 1950s.

The declaration was passed Monday night during a municipal council meeting, Mayor Ellen Anderson said at a media briefing Tuesday. That allows the town to qualify for provincial disaster relief funding.

Anderson said the damage to the town was far more extensive than first thought, particularly to the sprawling apple orchards in the Ravenna-Victoria Corners areas. She said the damage there was just as great as if downtown Thornbury - likely the town's major commercial area - had been destroyed, or if the Village at Blue had been lost.

More than a dozen orchard owners are now out of business after last week's F2 tornado leveled hundreds of acres of apple trees, she said.

Anderson said she expected a full accounting of the damages to take at least a month. There are many rural areas throughout the town that may have suffered damage that either haven't been found or reported yet.

For more, watch Friday's Enterprise-Bulletin.