EF2 Tornado — Weakley, Tennessee

2025-04-02 · near Ruthville, Weakley, Tennessee

Event narrative

A tornado touched down just west of the Weakley County line, east of Ralston Road between the Ruthville and Chestnut Glade communities. Multiple trees were uprooted along a field, with a metal barn completely destroyed along Vaughn Road. A nearby home had minor roof damage as well. The tornado continued eastward causing additional tree damage and damage to homes on Chestnut Glade Road. One home had the majority of its roof damaged in this area, with multiple surrounding trees either uprooted or snapped about midway up the tree. The tornado continued toward Mac Terrell Road, where the most significant damage occurred. The roof of a single family home was severely damaged, with a nearby manufactured home completely shifted from its foundation and close to the road. A nearby garage had multiple walls and the roof caved inward on the structure. Most of the trees in the area were either uprooted or snapped near their tops. The tornado continued through multiple fields, with additional tree damage noted. A home along Highway 118 sustained greater than 20 percent damage to its roof. As the tornado continued northeast, additional tree tops were snapped or trees uprooted with some minor roof damage to a home and barn outbuilding along Bill Nanney Road. The tornado lifted shortly thereafter, before the Austin Springs community. Peak winds were estimated at 120 mph.

Wider weather episode

A significant multi-hazard, multi-day event occurred across the Mid-South from April 2, 2025, to April 8, 2025, producing 35 tornadoes, record flooding, and numerous reports of damaging winds and large hail. A large upper-level trough covered the Western U.S. in early April. A significant piece of energy rotated around the base of the trough and ejected into the Southern Plains and the Middle-Upper Mississippi Valley on April 2nd. A 500 mb jet maximum of 120 knots and a 300 mb jet maximum of 140 knots pushed into Iowa by late afternoon on April 2nd. Meanwhile, a 992 mb surface low moved into the Upper Mississippi Valley with a trailing cold front pushing toward the Mid-South. A secondary, weaker surface low developed over northeast Arkansas and helped to back surface winds. The warm sector across the Mid-South was potent with surface dewpoints climbing into the upper 60s and MLCAPE values climbing to 2000-3000 J/kg. Increasing upper-level divergence occurred in the entrance region of the upper jet, resulting in strong lift across the Mid-South and storm initiation in the increasingly moist and unstable airmass. Hodographs were long, strongly curved, and supportive of tornadoes. Discrete supercells intensified across the Mid-South during the evening as 0-6 km bulk shear values increased to 60-70 knots, and 0-1 km helicity values increased to 300-400 m2/s2. Fifteen tornadoes occurred from late afternoon on April 2nd through about 2 am on April 3rd, including four EF-3s. This period represented the most significant period of severe weather during the event.

The cold front stalled across the Mid-South on April 3rd while moist southwesterly flow aloft continued and anomalous precipitable water values prevailed across the region. Heavy rain fell across northern sections of the Mid-South into the morning hours of April 3rd. Rainfall amounts of 3-4 inches were common across east-central Arkansas, West Tennessee, and extreme northwest Mississippi, along with scattered instances of flash flooding. By the afternoon of April 3rd, the airmass south of the stalled front destabilized and storms strengthened thanks to a 90-knot mid-level jet maximum moving through Missouri. These storms produced wind damage, large hail, flash flooding, and a tornado east of Corinth. Heavy rain continued into the early morning hours on April 4th when the front eventually lifted north of the area, resulting in a relative lull during the day on April 4th.

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Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1254960. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.