EF1 Tornado — Baltimore, Maryland
2024-06-05 · near Relay, Baltimore, Maryland
Event narrative
NWS Doppler Weather Radar in Sterling, Virginia showed a rotating thunderstorm that developed a tornado based on this survey. Weather spotters and residents reported a tornado touchdown in the vicinity of the I-95 and I-195 interchange around 8:45 PM EDT. This was confirmed with ground reports of several large tree trunks twisted
and snapped in the vicinity of Riverchase Apartments along Selford Road and Deer Run Court. The tornado continued east northeast along a narrow path toward Friendship Road and Francis Ave. Multiple trees and wires were down along this route in a confluent pattern. The most notable was a large oak tree snapped midway up the trunk. The tree ended up laying in the north-northeast direction onto two cars and a house nearby. An additional large oak tree and its root ball were laying 500 feet nearby closing off Friendship Road. Beyond this point, the tornado continued east northeast between Francis Avenue and Ingate Terrace. Additional large trees were sheared off along with large root balls toppled. Numerous power and phone lines were down as well with BGE and Verizon crews assessing and repairing the damage. Similar damage was observed as the tornado moved east southeast toward Elm and Oakland Road. Several large trees were snapped midway along Elm Road, Huntsmoor Road, Oakland Road, and Ashbourne Road. Wires were down as well with one power pole twisted
at its base at the intersection of Oakland Road and Elm Road.
Beyond this point the path widened a bit with two medium spruce trees down along Oregon Avenue and several large branches along Carville Avenue. The tornado proceeded to lift and cycle as it crossed US-1 at I-95 and Potomac Avenue around 8:48 PM EDT. The storm continued 1.4 miles east northeast toward Halethorpe, MD where
an additional touchdown was noted around 8:50 PM EDT. This was confirmed with several damage reports in the vicinity of the 3600 block of Commerce Drive and Washington Boulevard and Lansdowne Road. Multiple trees were snapped along a narrow path from the Home Depot over toward Alside Building Materials and Amazon HQ. The most notable damage was along Robert A Young Way between Alside Products and Amazon HQ. Four heavy overhead doors were blown out of the distribution warehouse along with pieces of the awning and roofing material removed from the Alside building. Several trees were also sheared at the canopy top within this same area. Additional large trees were taken down behind the LA-Fitness and Store-it storage facility along Washington Boulevard. After this point, the tornado crossed into Baltimore City.
Wider weather episode
On the afternoon and evening of Wednesday, June 5th, 2024, a warm front slowly lifted northeast across the eastern Panhandle of West Virginia into northern Virginia as well as central and northeastern Maryland. At the same time, low pressure tracked along the warm front causing severe thunderstorms and tornadoes to develop. Over a dozen tornadoes were confirmed in just under six hours.
View location on OpenStreetMap → (39.2348, -76.7063)
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1174101. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.