The first tornado ever recorded in Wisconsin in the usually frigid month of February that tore through mostly rural areas came on a day that broke records for warmth, setting up the perfect scenario for the type of severe weather normally seen in the late spring and summer.

At least one tornado was confirmed south of Madison and the National Weather Service was investigating reports of several more spawned from storms that swept across the southeastern part of the state around 5:30pm local time on Thursday, said meteorologist Taylor Patterson.

There were no reports of significant injuries. Local emergency management officials reported dozens of buildings, power lines and other structures that were damaged in the path of the storm that formed in eastern Iowa and died out near Milwaukee. The temperature was a record high for the date: 15 C (59 F).

Patrick Crull takes a photo of his flipped vehicle while inspecting damage to his property in Evansville, Wisconsin. – AP

"There wasn't anything inherently unusual about any of these storms when you compare them to other types of severe events we see during the summer and spring," Patterson said. "It's just unusual in the sense that it doesn't normally happen in February."

Hunter Oller, 20, of Brodhead, Wisconsin, and his friend were out fishing when the storm rolled in. They started to drive home but pulled over in the Town of Magnolia where they spotted two partially formed tornadoes and one tornado that seemed to touch the ground. Oller pulled out his cellphone.

"I was in awe," he said.

Oller called it an experience "I won't get the joy of seeing or experiencing for awhile".

Winter tornadoes are almost unheard of, especially in northern states.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported that between 1998 and 2022, 31 states across a broad swath of the country, from Washington state in the northwest to New Mexico in the south, Wisconsin in the Upper Midwest over to Maine in the northeast, didn't report a single tornado.

An aerial view of the damage from a confirmed tornado northwest of Evansville, Wisconsin. – AP

Tornadoes are most common in Wisconsin over the summer months between May and August. Since 1948, between November and February fewer than a dozen tornadoes total had been reported before Thursday, according to the weather service.

Meteorologists in Wisconsin began to worry about conditions coming together to create severe weather earlier in the week. On Thursday, "we knew that there things were starting to align much more than we had thought two days ago," Patterson said.

"All the ingredients coming together this time of year is what is unusual," she said.

The weather service dispatched teams across the path of the storm on Friday to determine how many tornadoes there were and at what severity. Photos and video taken near Evansville, Wisconsin, that were posted on social media sites clearly showed a tornado with lightning flashing around it.

"February is normally a month where we're very cold and we're getting snow, which are things that aren't very conducive to tornadoes," Patterson said. "Normally, for thunderstorms severe enough to create tornadoes, we need a lot of moisture, we need a lot of warm temperatures and during the winter months we're just normally not in an environment that is conducive for that."

Debris from a nearby farm sits in a field in Evansville, Wisconsin. – AP

Conditions collided in Wisconsin late afternoon on Thursday creating the perfect conditions for tornadoes to form, Patterson said. That included rapidly warming temperatures that topped out at a record-tying 13 C (55 F) in Madison and more moisture with rapidly rising air, creating thunderstorms, Patterson said.

"The other thing that we had going for us is it was really windy yesterday," she said. 

Creating wind shear is important for creating tornadoes: "That basically helps us sustain that rotation that is needed for tornadoes."