EF1 tornado in Christian County, Illinois
Tornado March 31, 2023 · Christian County, Illinois
The path drawn at its surveyed width of 30 yards (0.02 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.
What the National Weather Service wrote
A tornado touched down 2 miles south of Taylorville at 7:13 PM CDT. It tracked east-northeastward, knocking down about 30 power poles along North 1250 East Road (Taylorville-Nokomis Blacktop) before dissipating in an open field just east of the road at 7:14 PM CDT.
The wider storm
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.
Began near Hewittsville (39.5000, -89.3100).
Other tornadoes from the same storm system
12 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1083270. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.
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