EF2 tornado in Troup County, Georgia

This long-track tornado originated in Chambers County, Alabama. The entire survey was conducted by NWS Birmingham. Estimated start point was near County Road 114 west of Highway 431 to the southwest of Five Points. Northeast of Five Points, the tornado intensified, snapping and uprooting many trees along County Road 267 and causing roof damage to a barn. The swath of timber damage became almost a mile wide along County Roads 281 and 282 and at least one residence there suffered roof damage. The tornado continued to intensify as it crossed County Road 268 where large swaths of pine trees were snapped. A manufactured home was completely destroyed and blown downstream near County Road 278. Most of the structural damage happened along County Road 284. A couple residences suffered significant shingle damage, one had siding damage, and a manufactured home had its porch ripped off, impacting its walls. Another manufactured building was blown off its footings. Another significant swath of snapped pines was observed on County Road 283, some snapped off only a couple feet off the ground. The tornado then crossed into Georgia, continuing to snap trees along West Point Lake. Numerous trees were snapped along the end of North State Line Rd.as the tornado crossed the lake. The tornado began to weaken some as it made its way into Deer Point Rd and Rock Mills Road where tree damage and some damage to shingles and gutters occurred for a few homes. The tornado continued east through mostly wooded areas, doing damage to pines and crossing just north of a few homes along Neely Rd. Weakening continued as it continued NE with only minor tree damage occurring before the tornado dissipated along Cameron Mill Rd.

A line of strong thunderstorms moved into north and central Georgia during the afternoon through the evening on Thursday, January 12th and spawned numerous tornadoes, including several that were long track and significant. Ahead of this line, a few supercells also spawned tornadoes in portions of central and eastern Georgia. Upon further examination of radar data and high resolution areal imagery, it was found that several tornadoes rotated around and within a larger vortex and caused the widespread damage in the area near Griffin GA, over 2 miles wide in some cases.

The result was that as many as 4 tornadoes were on the ground simultaneously in SW Spalding County, which were rotating around the larger circulation, merging together in several cases and crossing paths. The presence of 3 mergers was identified in the reanalysis. Additional analysis revealed that wind speeds in the EF3 storm reached

as high as 155mph or high end EF3. This confirmed a total of 14 tornadoes, including 10 which resulted from the same storm/larger mesocyclone.