Volunteers come together in Pontiac, Que., after tornado

Pontiac, Que., is praising volunteers for donating their time to clean up debris this weekend after one of the six tornadoes that ripped through the capital region last week touched down in western Quebec.

"The idea is to clean as much of the land and roads as possible," said Tom Howard,a volunteer firefighter in Pontiac as well as acity councillor, in French.

"It makes me happy that people come together in times of need and are not selfish. They want to help their neighbours. It's sad that something like this had to happen for people to go out and help each other, but it makes me feel good."

Coun. Leslie-Anne Barber echoed Howard's sentiments, adding that things are starting to return to normal after a trying week.

"In the last two or three days, it was calmer," she said. "Before that there was a lot of emergency work to repair, to make sure that the roofs were covered in case of rain. So this is really the cleaning phase that begins."

Pontiac Mayor Joanne Labadiepraised the volunteers for donating their time and, in some instances, their equipment.

"We have a team of professional volunteers who are workers with big trucks, heavy equipment, shovels to pick up all the green debris on private land," she said.

The Breckenridgeneighbourhood in the southeast part of Pontiac was the hardest hit, with1,000 trees felled by the storm, according to the mayor.