a mini tornado, accompanied by hail and drenching rain, yesterday halted Tiger Woods' drive to regain golf's world No.1 ranking at the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando.

Woods had just holed an 11-foot putt for birdie at the second hole to move three clear of his rivals at 12 under par when play was halted just after 2pm local time.

There were dramatic scenes as players were rushed from the course, while reporters in the Media Centre were advised to head for the safety of the clubhouse.

Central Florida was then lashed by driving rain and hail, and with the Weather Channel labelling the storm a mini tornado, uprooted trees and tossed over TV structures, added to the debris strewn around a flooded Bay Hill course.

Two hours later, officials deemed any further play unsafe, declaring a 10am Monday morning restart to the $6.2m event. "The golf course is gone, bunkers are gone. We're going to need time for the course to drain," PGA official Mike Russell said through the organisation's Twitter account.

"We didn't get in much play – only two holes – and hopefully the course will be drained and we can get after it tomorrow," said Woods, who will dislodge Rory McIlroy as No.1 with victory today.

"At least we got a little activity in today, so we're not completely stagnant. We've dealt with this before. We had that fog delay in San Diego, and this is part of playing outside. We've got to deal with conditions like this."

Four players, all Americans, were in second place on nine under – Keegan Bradley, Ken Duke, Rickie Fowler and John Huh.

Sergio Garcia will not be teeing off today, though, with the Spaniard pulling out owing to a horror round on Saturday. At one point he climbed into a tree to play out an errant ball and called time on his tournament not long after.

England's Justin Rose also got through two holes yesterday, dropping another shot after his disappointing round on Saturday to fall to eight under, while the round of the day belonged to Bubba Watson, who moved from one over to four under with a closing 67.

Scotland's Martin Laird had just parred the 13th to be at one over par when play was halted.

Laird started his day at one under but had slipped to one over with bogeys at the fourth, sixth and ninth holes before his only birdie, when he holed he two-putted from 60 feet at the par-5 12th.

Among those who managed to complete their rounds was former Scottish, Welsh and US Open champion Graeme McDowell, breaking par for the first time this week with a score of 69 for a tally of two over.

Despite a disappointing week, McDowell is pleased with his game ahead of his next event, the Masters.

"The great thing is that the most important parts of my game – my bunker play, my short game and my putting – going into Augusta are the strengths of my game," said McDowell. "So that is very pleasing.

"Those are the parts of my game I wanted to address ahead of the Masters and those aspects probably have never been as good as they are right now."

Meanwhile, Rory McIlroy will return to earthquake ravaged Haiti for two days prior to next month's Masters. It will be McIlroy's second trip as a UNICEF Ireland Ambassador since visiting the Caribbean island in June 2011.