THIS is the remarkable video footage captured by a terrified family as they came face-to-face with a freak tornado at their Tableland farm.

The amazing footage was taken by the Gallo family at Upper Barron as the tornado ripped through a corn field and destroyed irrigation pipes before taking a menacing turn straight for the family home.

Pictures: Cairns' amazing weather

The final moments of the footage show the family taking cover inside the house, convinced the tornado is on course for a direct hit, before it takes a last minute turn and avoids the structure.

The video, which shows the twister and its path, was given to The Cairns Post yesterday by Ghis Gallo who said her husband Adrian and eight-year-old son Max were enthralled by the weather event on Tuesday afternoon.

Pictures: Twister on the Atherton Tableland

"I was staring out the kitchen window, it was very volatile weather, and I saw this thing building up," she said.

"I saw it swirling around and thought this thing looks like a twister.

"It was coming straight down the hill, the cattle were running away from it."

Did you see the Tableland twister? Tell us what you saw or share a picture.

The tornado tore a 5m-wide track through a corn field while pipes and tractor tyres were found 100m away.

"Nobody has seen anything like this before. All the neighbours were calling asking if we saw it," Mrs Gallo said.

"The kids thought it was fun but when it started coming towards the house, it was scary."

Video: Family films tornado aftermath

Another Tableland resident, Robert Strachan, saw the tornado emerge from the storm clouds from his vantage point of Halloran's Hill, near Atherton.

"It just came spinning down. It is a remarkable site for around here," he said.

And Atherton resident Chris Gueho saw the twister "hurling tractor-sized tyres around like a toy".

Weather bureau duty forecaster Janine Yuasa said the twister was the same as those that occur in the famed Tornado Alley in the US, but on a much smaller scale.

She said Tuesday's tornado was associated with thunderstorms moving across the Tableland.

"Tornadoes, the really bad ones, are definitely associated with severe thunderstorms," she said.

"It is exactly the same kind of thing (that happens in the US).

"It is all about the mixture of dryer and cooler air with moist, warm air.

"There is a lot of air running through thunder storms, both up and down and side to side. That is what causes the rotation."

Latest Cairns weather

She said tornadoes in Queensland were not unusual.

"They are not as uncommon as we think, it is just often they happen in uninhabited areas where people don't witness them," she said.

View more Tableland twister video footage

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