EFU Tornado — Scott, Illinois

2023-03-31 · near Oxville, Scott, Illinois

Event narrative

A tornado briefly touched down in the Illinois River bottoms about 6.5 miles west-northwest of Winchester at 5:15 PM CDT. No damage was observed.

Wider weather episode

Two rounds of strong to severe thunderstorms spawned 13 tornadoes across central Illinois during the afternoon and evening of March 31st...including an EF-3 tornado that killed 3 people in Robinson in Crawford County. The first round of convection developed along a warm front lifting northeastward through the area during the afternoon. These storms were primarily very large hail-producers, with up to baseball-sized (2.75 diameter) hail being reported in the town of Banner in Fulton County. Once the warm front lifted into northern Illinois, a modestly unstable but highly sheared environment was in place during the late afternoon and evening...with CAPE values of 1500-2500J/kg and 0-6km bulk shear in excess of 70kt. As a trailing cold front approached from the west, additional supercell thunderstorms developed that produced tornadoes, very large hail, and damaging wind gusts. The cells eventually congealed into a broken line as they pushed eastward to the I-57 corridor by mid-evening. Meanwhile, a discrete supercell ahead of the line tracked south of I-70, dropping the EF-3 tornado in Crawford County.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (39.6600, -90.5800)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1083238. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.