Ohio State officials are still trying to figure out how much it will cost to repair several buildings that were severely damaged when a tornado ripped through the Wooster campus Thursday.

“We’re just now assessing the damage and we just don’t really know at this point as to how much and how long it’s going to take,” said Bobby Moser, dean of the College of Food, Agriculture and Environmental Sciences.

“In some areas, it is going to be expensive in terms of cost and time,” Moser said.

He said the agricultural engineering building, the farm operations facility and the main administration building received the worst damage.

The campus’ original farm house, which is more than 100 years old, and the campus police station, will also require significant work, Moser said.

Seven of the university’s greenhouses were “basically destroyed,” he said, and the 102-year-old arboretum will require extensive repairs.

“About a third of the arboretum is very heavily damaged because of the loss of large trees,” said Ken Cochran, program director for the Secrest Arboretum.

The storm damaged the newest section of the arboretum, which housed themed gardens. A new garden room was leveled to the foundation, Cochran said.

Neither Cochran nor Moser was in the area when the storm hit.

Research scientist Robert Hansen, however, was working late in his office at the agriculture engineering building when the tornado struck.

After hearing the sirens, “it didn’t register with me that it was a tornado,” he said. But then, “I felt the velocity of the wind magnify immensely.”

The wind was so strong it prevented him from opening the door to go downstairs, he said.

Though it rendered significant damage, the storm did not last long.

“Within seconds — I’m saying 30 seconds at the most — that’s gone,” Hansen said. “The storm has come and gone.”

Because he works in one of the most severely damaged buildings, Hansen has not been able to return to his office.

The tornado’s path of destruction was narrow, but the debris required Hansen and his colleagues to take an alternate route off of the campus, he said.

“There was a lot of debris everywhere including bricks, concrete blocks and of course, lots of glass,” Hansen said. “I was just amazed at what (the storm) did.”

Cochran found a piece from the research services building lobby eight-tenths of a mile from the building.

It has not been determined when repairs will begin.

“We’re not there yet, but we hope it will start as soon as possible,” Moser said. “We are doing some temporary things now.”

Temporary fixes include boarding windows and erecting temporary roofs over certain buildings, he said.

The neighboring Agricultural Technical Institute, OSU’s two-year undergraduate campus for the College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, received no damage, but had to delay student move-in because of power outages.

Because there were no serious injuries, the most serious loss might have been to graduate research.

“That, I think, is the tragedy,” Hansen said, “once we figured out no one was hurt.”