EF1 Tornado — Lee, North Carolina

2025-07-06 · near Rosser, Lee, North Carolina

Event narrative

An EF-1 tornado touched down at the Raleigh Executive Jetport 7.5 miles northeast of Sanford in Lee County, North Carolina. Several hangers had damage to wall panels and doors. Several aircraft were damaged. Minor damage to the taxiway occurred. The tornado briefly lifted before touching back down near its end point, and resulted in minor damage to several mobile homes and several trees that were snapped and uprooted.

Wider weather episode

Tropical Storm Chantal made landfall over northeastern South Carolina during the morning hours of July 6. The remnants of Chantal then tracked west-northwest into portions of central North Carolina, stalling out over the area before tracking east-northeast into Virginia by the 7th of July. Catastrophic flash flooding occurred from record rainfall of up to 11 inches in some spots of the Piedmont, included 6 flash flood fatalities across Chatham, Alamance, and Orange Counties. Widespread flooding particularly affected the counties of Orange, Chatman, and Moore. Four EF-1 tornadoes also touched down over portions Lee, Chatham, Alamance, and Orange Counties. Preliminary loss estimates across central North Carolina exceeded 40 million.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (35.5800, -79.1000)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1277002. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.