Thunderstorm Wind — Fayette, Kentucky

2024-04-02 · near Viley, Fayette, Kentucky

Event narrative

The National Weather Service visited several concentrated areas of damage across Fayette county. On Alexandria Street northwest of downtown, near High Point Farm, several decayed trees were downed and a barn was damaged. Estimated straight-lined winds of up to 80 mph likely caused this damage.

The National Weather Service storm survey team confirmed straight-line wind damage on Versailles Rd (Highway 60) in Lexington. There were many topped, twisted, and uprooted trees, and facing to the east. The wind damage was consistently between 60 and 65 mph along Versailles Road. However, at the Lexington, Fayette County emergency services center on Cisco Rd, two large trailers, fully loaded and chalked, were moved to the east. A light pole got snapped from its ground anchor. Several cars were damaged by the falling trees. Wind speed estimates here were 75 to 85 mph.

Another area of damage at 1202 Versailles Rd at a strip mall, had some roof panels and trees topped, twisted and uprooted. Straight-line winds speeds were estimated to be around 70 mph.

Another focused damage point occurred in the 1800 block of Melrose Ave. Several large and old pin oak trees were felled by straight-lined winds of 80-100 mph. A few of these fell on homes, including one that had residents inside, one with a head injury. Another tree fell on a car, whose owner had just gotten out of the vehicle.

No known damage occurred southeast of this area until closer to Athens. Some damage was noted along Athens-Boonesboro Rd, close to I-75. A more concentrated area of tree damage occurred along the north end of Canebrook Dr. A row of about a dozen softwood trees were snapped, parallel to I-75. The people cleaning up the damage said all the trees were laying out to the east. Once again 90-100 mph winds likely caused this damage.

The damage path ended along BlueSky Parkway and KingPost Rd, where some garage doors got busted inward and a large part of metal structures roof was peeled off. Estimated wind speeds here were 85-95 mph.

Wider weather episode

As a surface low cut across Missouri and Illinois, its eastward stretching warm front moved north across central Indiana while its cold front moved east towards the Lower Ohio Valley. This placed central Kentucky in the warm sector, where 3 separate lines of convection moved through during the day. The first line of storms generating from an early morning outflow boundary dropped southeast through the area. This produced six tornadoes, mainly through the Bluegrass region. The second line, moving west to east, just produced some passing showers and thunderstorms. The third line, just ahead of the cold front, moved through during the evening hours. This produced three more tornadoes along the Interstate 71 corridor. One of these tornadoes began in Clark County, Indiana before crossing the Ohio River into Kentucky.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (38.0626, -84.5626)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1176672. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.