When you're living near a mountainside, one of the last things you would expect to see moving fast at higher elevations would be a tornado, but that's what happened in Utah on Friday.

According to the Salt Lake City, Utah, branch of the U.S. National Weather Service (NWS), a rare, strong twister occurred near Fruit Heights, Utah. The funnel first made contact with the ground near a summit along the ridgeline extending west from Francis Peak, at an elevation of about 7,500 feet (almost 2,300 metres).

Tornadoes are uncommon at very high elevation due to drier air and less favourable thunderstorm dynamics.

Brittany Whitlam, a NWS meteorologist who works at the Sa...