EF0 tornado in Washington County, Pennsylvania

Tornado May 16, 2025 · Washington County, Pennsylvania

EF0

Rating

0.5 mi

Path length

75 yd

Path width

$10K

Damage as recorded

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The path drawn at its surveyed width of 75 yards (0.04 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF0 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF0 is light damage: shingles and siding peeled, gutters torn, branches broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 65–85 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

The National Weather Service in Pittsburgh conducted a storm survey based on drone footage. The damage south of East Finley Washington County Pennsylvania, between Birch Road to Elwood Day Road, was determined to be caused by a weak EF0 tornado. The damage was to hardwood trees with large limbs just west of Birch Road and continued east. This was a heavily wooded area where vehicle access was limited. Drone pictures provided to the National Weather Service showed a convergence signature in open fields between the two roads in addition to around ten downed trees that were not visible by automobiles.

The wider storm

A couple bands of thunderstorms formed ahead of a warm front during the afternoon of May 16th, leading to a brief tornado in Washington County and a single wind report in Jefferson County. Later on, in the warm and humid airmass behind the front, a decaying mesoscale convective system crossed Ohio and into Pennsylvania just north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Several reports of downed trees were received from these storms just after midnight on the 17th.

Began near Gale (40.0144, -80.3590).

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1266032. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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