Book excerpt: On October 15, 1954, Hurricane Hazel battered southern Ontario, leaving in its wake a terrible toll: thousands homeless, $25 million in property damage, and worst of all, 81 people dead. Hazel destroyed bridges, submerged towns, and drowned unsuspecting Ontarians. After the storm, people walked the surreal streets: cars upside down, iceboxes and dead cows hanging from trees, houses flattened, toys and furniture floating past. On its fiftieth anniversary, Jim Gifford has captured that fatal night in the voices of those who survived it. Including more than 100 never-before-published photographs, Hurricane Hazel: Canada's Storm of the Century documents one of the worst natural disasters in Canadian history.