Thunderstorm Wind — Bell, Kentucky

2025-05-20 · near Dorton Branch, Bell, Kentucky

Event narrative

The 911 call center reported 6 trees and a power line down along KY-66 in Bell County.

Wider weather episode

At 7 AM EST the morning of the 20th, a strong low pressure center was situated over the NE/IA border, with a warm frontextended SEward across IL, SW IN, and KY and beginning to stall out a bit. A cold front was also present, extending south and west from the lows center across the Central/Southern Plains (MO/OK/TX). By 1 PM EST the stalled front began slowly migrating northward again as a warm front, placing much of Kentucky in the warm and moist sector through the afternoon, ripe for storm development. A line of convection had developed south of the warm front during the morning hours, pushing out of western Kentucky and western Tennessee, and increasing in strength as it moved eastward through the more unstable environment towards eastern Kentucky by early afternoon. This first line exited the state by 5pm, generally causing wind/tree damage in it's wake. At around 1 PM EST, another round of convection began to initiate along the cold front in Arkansas. Four hours later, this line of convection had expanded, and could be seen from western Kentucky southwest through Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, with supercell like structures embedded within the overall broken line of convection. This secondary line associated with the cold front traversed the state, reaching eastern Kentucky by 8 PM, before exiting around midnight. The storms remained strong as they came through the NWS Jackson, KY coverage area, causing widespread wind damage to trees and power lines. Harlan County even sported a 61 mph gust as the storms moved through. By the end of the event, Kentucky faired very well, with mainly wind reports. Meanwhile, other states to the north and south saw tornadoes and large hail, in addition to the widespread wind damage.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (36.7729, -83.6701)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1292454. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.