EF2 Tornado — Wayne, Mississippi

2024-12-28 · near Chicora, Wayne, Mississippi

Event narrative

The tornado began just west of Chicora River Road near the Chicora community and quickly moved across the K-M Nursery. Several greenhouses at the nursery were damaged with several trees uprooted or snapped all around the nursery, producing EF-1 damage. The tornado moved east-northeast across the Chickasawhay River and over another 1-1.5 miles of inaccessible land. The tornado began to intensify as it approached Old 45 Winchester Road with numerous pine trees snapped low. The worst damage was noted along Taylor Circle as the tornado intensified to EF-2 strength. A new, manufactured home was completely rolled off its cinder blocks and pushed toward the road and a nearby house. There were 4 injuries in the manufactured home. The home across the street sustained roof damage with blown-out windows. Several cars were destroyed by falling trees or debris. A significant corridor of damage was noted on the north side of Taylor Circle as nearly every large tree was snapped with more damage to roofs. The tornado continued off to the northeast, producing a significant corridor of tree damage based on drone imagery from MEMA. The tornado crossed Highway 45 before damaging a church and a few long chicken houses. The metal roof was peeled off most of the chicken houses with one chicken house partially destroyed. More tree damage and roof damage occurred along both Buckatunna Mount Zion and Cane Mill Roads. Very sporadic damage was noted along Denham Buckatunna Creek Road. The tornado may have extended to the northeast beyond the tree line, however, the area was inaccessible due to Buckatunna Creek. Future adjustments to the track are possible given that some of the track was inaccessible due to rivers and densely forested areas. Update 2/24/2025: Adjusted tornado path length to extend northeast through Denham Progress Road thanks to Sentinel satellite imagery that became available. The tornado continued sporadic tree damage to the northeast and there was even a single chicken farm that was partially destroyed visible on the imagery. The tornado lifted just after hitting this chicken farm as any evidence of tree or structure damage becomes non-existent. Only other change was to increase the path width to 550 yards based on the Sentinel imagery.

Wider weather episode

A multi-day severe weather episode occurred across southeast Mississippi into southwest and south-central Alabama and the Florida Panhandle with round #1 beginning the afternoon of December 27th and lasting through the evening hours and round #2 beginning the afternoon of December 28th and lasting into the early morning hours of December 29th. Multiple tornadoes and areas of damage were reported.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (31.5803, -88.5904)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1225949. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.