EF1 Tornado — Huron, Ohio

2023-06-15 · near Olena, Huron, Ohio

Event narrative

This tornado began in vicinity of New State Road and Townline Road 131, where it downed a deteriorated barn. The tornado continued southeast toward the village of North Fairfield, intensified, lifted a large portion of a roof off an outbuilding, and downed several trees on Hanville Corners Road. A power pole was separated from power lines with additional tree damage. The tornado entered North Fairfield and caused widespread tree and power line damage in the village. Some roofing material was lifted off residences and some trees fell onto homes. A large sign was ripped off the facade of a building and several light and power poles were leaning along Main Street (OH-162). Damage in the village was at the EF0 to EF1 level and this is where the tornado was widest along its path.

The tornado continued southeastward across Penn Road toward Old State Road and Olive Road, where a large area of snapped and shredded trees fell and additional damage occurred to several barns and outbuildings. The greatest damage occurred near the intersection of Old State Road and Townline Road 12, where the tornado's estimated peak winds reached 110 mph. Several large trees were snapped, a mobile home was damaged heavily, and three power poles were snapped at their bases. As the tornado persisted farther southeast toward Boughtonville Road, several silos were damaged heavily. Near Edwards Road and Boughtonville Road, several roofs were displaced from outbuildings and the second floor of a residence was damaged heavily. The tornado continued toward Greenwich Milan Townline Road, where a large swath of trees were snapped. Minor tree and power pole damage occurred near the intersection of US-224 and Greenwich Milan Townline Road, west of the village of Greenwich, just before the tornado dissipated.

Wider weather episode

A cold front moved into northwest Ohio the evening of Thursday, June 15. A weak surface low pressure developed along this front over southern Michigan earlier in the day and moved southeast across the western tip of Lake Erie during the evening. A warm front extended southeast of this low pressure along the western Lake Erie shoreline and then down towards central Ohio. Thunderstorms erupted along the cold front near Toledo just before 6:00 PM and moved southeast towards east-central Ohio over the coming hours. Enhanced vertical wind shear associated with the low pressure and warm front allowed storms to rotate amidst an unstable environment. A particularly intense supercell (rotating thunderstorm) developed near the Ohio/Michigan border just north of Toledo and tracked across parts of Lucas, Ottawa, Sandusky, Erie, Huron, Seneca, Richland, Ashland, and Wayne Counties. This supercell was responsible for nine tornadoes and numerous instances of large hail, with hail to at least the size of tennis balls reported near Toledo and multiple reports of hail to golf ball sized or larger as the storm continued southeast. Heavy rainfall from this supercell also produced flash flooding across Huron County. Storms gradually congealed into a line that produced some hail and straight-line convective wind damage into east central Ohio.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (41.1406, -82.6025)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1122835. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.