TornadoLookup

Home / Tennessee / Giles

EF1 tornado in Giles County, Tennessee

Tornado January 1, 2022 · Giles County, Tennessee

EF1
Rating
16.7 mi
Whole path
150 yd
Path width
$50K
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Limestone County, Alabama → Giles County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 150 yards (0.09 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF1 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF1 is moderate damage: roofs badly stripped, mobile homes pushed off foundations or overturned, windows broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 86–110 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

This tornado touched down in Limestone County, Alabama near the intersection of Persimmon Tree Road and Siniard Road, where a few trees were snapped or uprooted. It moved to the northeast, snapping and uprooting numerous trees as it crossed Tommy Hill Road and Lester Road. As the tornado crossed Holly Lane, it downed dozens of trees. It continued its northeastward progression, uprooting trees along Salem Minor Hill Road and Gardner Holly Road. It then continued into Giles County, Tennessee. Special thanks to the Limestone County EMA for their assistance with this survey. In Tennessee, the tornado continued northeast where NASA satellite imagery showed it blew down dozens of trees south of Hagan Road. On the eastern end of Hagan Road, two homes received minor damage and several outbuildings were destroyed. Another home had minor damage on Case Road at Bethel Road. The worst damage occurred on Alf Harris Road where several homes and outbuildings received significant damage. The tornado then turned more eastward and passed just north of the Prospect community, before more homes and outbuildings were damaged on Liberty Road, Kelley Road, and Prospect Elkton Road. The tornado lifted just west of Elkton, Tennessee. Total path length of this EF-1 tornado in Alabama and Tennessee was 16.9 miles. Special thanks to Giles County EMA for their help with this storm damage survey.

The wider storm

Numerous thunderstorms affected much of Middle Tennessee during the early morning hours on January 1st, then again during the afternoon hours. These storms produced several reports of wind damage and one EF-1 tornado in Giles County.

Began near Thorne Store (34.9969, -87.1023).

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1004580. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

Tornadoes near your address

See every tornado that passed near a place you know, measured to its path.