EF1 tornado in Franklin County, Texas

This EF1 tornado with estimated maximum winds near 104 mph developed within a QLCS and began along Highway 37 just north of Winnsboro in southwest Franklin County where it snapped and uprooted several trees. The tornado continued east along Farm-to-Market Road 3357, County Road 3430, and County Road 4340 and continued snapping and uprooting numerous trees as it crossed County Road 4335, County Road 4345, and began to move along FM Road 1448. Tree damage became more extensive as it approached the intersection of FM Road 1448 and FM Road 115. At this location, most of the metal roof panels were removed from a

South Franklin Fire Department building. Farther east, two homes in the New Hope community were damaged. One house lost almost all of the upwind portion of its roof when the section overhanging a porch was uplifted. A manufactured home also lost a portion of its roof, causing part of a wall failure. Two residents were in this part of the manufactured home at the time but were uninjured. Metal roof panels on a neighboring outbuilding were also peeled back and twisted. Farther north, a church on County Road

4395 lost some of its roof. More softwood trees were snapped and uprooted along County Road 4396 before the tornado moved over Lake Bob Sandlin and crossed into Camp County. The tornado tracked just over 10 miles in southern Franklin County.

A very mature squall line developed along and ahead of an advancing cold front across the Ark-La-Tex region during the mid to late morning into early afternoon on March 4th. Damaging wind gusts were the primary threat with this squall line, but numerous strong mesovorticies became embedded within this quasi-linear convective system (QLCS). Dew points were in the mid to upper 60s with over 500 J/kg of MLCAPE and 450 m2/s2 of 0-1 km storm relative helicity (SRH). As temperatures continued to warm into the lower 70s with MLCAPE increasing to around 1000 J/kg MLCAPE, the increasing threat of supercell thunderstorm development only heightened the tornado threat. As a result, numerous reports of damaging straight-line wind gusts and several tornadoes were documented across East and Northeast Texas.