Chaos at E-Town: When a Tornado Hijacked Formula Drift

Where Were You June 19th?

That’s the question the Formula Drift broadcast team posed during the Top 32 on Saturday, just two days after one of the most unpredictable moments in the sport’s recent history. The skies over Englishtown, New Jersey turned hostile in an instant, and by the time it was over, tents had been launched, cars (racecars and spectator parked cars) were damaged, and the paddock looked like a warzone.

"This is scary. Fortunately, nobody got hurt. Tents were flying. Cars got damaged. Act of God here," said Jarod DeAnda during the main FD event on Saturday. And they weren’t exaggerating.

The Storm Hits

Thursday at E-Town kicked off like any other Formula Drift practice day. Teams were dialed in, drivers fine-tuning their lines, everyone locked into the grind. Just another day in the trenches.

But things shifted—fast.

Wind started punching harder. Not a breeze, not a gust—this had teeth. You could feel the paddock start to react. Flags snapping sideways, canopies tugging at their straps. Crews looked up. Something was off.

Then lightning cracked across the sky, and FD got on the mic: “Get the hell out of the bleachers.”

Seconds later, it hit.

Awnings tore off and flew like kites. Tables flipped. Parts and tools scattered. The paddock went from calm to carnage in under a minute. Crews scrambled—some tried holding their setups down, others just ran for cover. Nobody had time to figure it out. You either moved, or you got moved.

The Radium tent? That thing got launched. Landed up in the bleachers like a piece of drift history that got hung up at the E-Town museum.

Even concrete ballast blocks—two-foot cubes—got lifted and tossed like props. That’s not just wind. That’s raw, unpredictable force you don’t plan for.

Some people got dragged into snack shacks. Others ducked into bathrooms or behind rigs. Total strangers were pulling each other to safety. The grid area? Littered. The paddock? Wrecked.

And meanwhile, just across the airstrip—completely unaware—a Cessna casually took off and landed like it was any other afternoon.

When it was over, it looked like a bomb went off. Gear was gone. Tents shredded. Cars hit. And everybody was asking the same thing:

What the hell just happened?

Stories from the Ground

This is where it got real.

Forget tire strategy. Forget podium dreams. For a few minutes, none of that mattered. It wasn’t about drifting—it was about survival.

Jack Shanahan? Caught in a port-a-potty when the storm hit. No cover. No warning. Just plastic walls and prayer.

Rome Charpentier’s dad? Same story. Same place. Different stall.

Rome himself? He didn’t run. He spotted a mom and her kid scrambling for shelter and helped them into a port-a-potty to get them out of the chaos. No cameras. No fanfare. Just instinct.

One guy got yanked into a snack shack by a complete stranger. Another pulled a woman from a truck before it got ugly and got her inside a building just in time.

Everywhere you turned, someone was stepping up. People ditching gear to grab a hand. Drivers helping fans. Crew helping crew. No titles, no teams—just people reacting like it mattered. Because it did.

This wasn’t about tents flying. This wasn’t about wrecked gear. It was about the fact that everybody came out the other side still standing.

The Aftermath

Jeff Jones probably took the worst of it. A tree came down straight on his 370Z—caved in the roof, punched through the windshield. It looked totaled. Game over.

But it wasn’t.

Within hours, people were already swarming around the car. Crew, friends, even folks from other teams—everyone grabbed a tool, a torch, a welder. The goal was simple: get Jeff back on track.

FD’s Competition Director, Kevin Wells, came through. He said if the roof and front roll bar could be brought back to spec, Jeff could run. That was all the green light this community needed.

They made it happen. In one night. That car went from crushed to cleared. By Saturday, Jeff was back in the fight.

That’s the drift community.

Elsewhere in the paddock, the damage was everywhere—awnings shredded, gear blown out, setups flipped. But somehow, nobody folded. Teams regrouped. Fans came back. FD kept it moving. The comp ran as planned.

To outsiders, it might just look like “the show went on.”

But if you were there? You know it was way bigger than that.

The Drift Family Stays Standing

This wasn’t just some freak storm. This was a pressure test. And the Formula Drift community didn’t flinch.

Could’ve been easy to pack it in. No one would’ve blamed them. Gear was wrecked. Cars got hit. Everyone took a loss in one way or another. But instead of tapping out, people stepped up.

Drivers were helping other teams. Crew guys were handing off tools to crews they don’t even know. People were sharing trailers, sharing parts, sharing whatever they had left. Nobody asked for credit. Nobody waited to be told.

Because that’s what this scene is built on.

No one walked away from that storm untouched—but nobody walked away alone either. The drift fam held it down, start to finish.

That’s what makes this sport different. That’s why it keeps growing. It’s not just smoke and style—it’s substance. It’s people who give a damn.

Reflections & Lessons

What happened at E-Town was an act of God. But it’s hard not to ask some tough questions.

Should event organizers take a closer look at safety protocols moving forward? Will Formula Drift mandate sturdier pit infrastructure—reinforced canopies, weighted anchors, or even standardized safety gear for each team’s setup? These aren't just theoretical questions. They're conversations already happening behind closed trailers.

What kind of financial burden would these changes bring? Most teams already operate on razor-thin budgets. Between travel, tires, tuning, and parts, the cost of competing in just a single round is a heavy lift. Adding mandatory safety equipment or pit structure requirements could tip the scale for grassroots teams barely keeping up. Will it lead to tiered expectations—one set for the pros, another for the privateers?

And what about the teams themselves—are they mentally and logistically prepared for another incident? Are internal discussions happening now about how to minimize damage in future high-risk situations? Because for many of them, losing a car—or even a canopy—mid-season could mean the end of their year.

From the racetrack perspective, some tough questions need to be asked. Should facilities provide better shelter access for crews, media, officials, and fans? Is it time to reassess the landscaping—trees lining pit lane, paddock zones, or spectator lots may add aesthetic appeal, but also carry risk. The grid at E-Town had trees directly bordering the lineup. It’s not hard to imagine worse outcomes had things gone just a bit differently.

The bigger question is this: will track owners see safety investments as worthwhile—not just in hindsight, but as a standard of care? Will the sport of drifting, or motorsport as a whole, continue to grow in cultural relevance and influence enough to push these improvements forward?

If the community continues to show up, share these stories, and fill the stands—maybe then the dollars follow. Maybe then the infrastructure catches up to the passion.

The storm may have been unprecedented, but the sport’s response can set a precedent for what safety and unity look like under pressure.