EF2 tornado in Holmes County, Mississippi

Tornado initially touched down and tracked northeast through the area south of Yazoo City. At this point, the tornado was narrow and weak, with only relatively minor tree damage observed. As the tornado crossed Highway 16 on the east side of Yazoo City, it became wider and stronger. Several homes and businesses sustained roof damage along Highway 16 and Old Benton Road, and numerous trees were snapped and uprooted. The tornado maintained this strength for a number of miles as it moved northeast, snapping, splintering and uprooting a number of hardwood and softwood trees as well as downing powerlines. The tornado weakened somewhat as it crossed into Holmes County, before reintensifying again at Ebenezer Coxburg Road. Here is where the tornado reached its maximum intensity, with several homes and a church suffering significant roof damage along with swaths of trees being splintered or snapped. Winds here were estimated to be 115 mph, at the low end of EF2. The tornado then weakened again before dissipating just to the northwest of the Brozville community. The tornado had a total path length of 29 miles across Yazoo and Holmes Counties.

A round of severe thunderstorms containing tornadoes, large hail and damaging winds, occurred Tuesday December 9th into Tuesday night across much of the Lower Mississippi River Valley. These storms developed along and ahead of a strong surface cold front and strong upper level disturbance. A surface low developed to our west and tracked eastward increasing the winds and drawing northward deep moisture and instability. The cold front steadily pushed east and clashed with the unstable and highly sheared environment and produced numerous severe thunderstorms as a squall line developed and tracked eastward across the region.

This event produced 16 tornadoes along with many reports of large hail, and wind damage. The majority of the severe weather occurred across central and southern Mississippi. Of the 16 tornadoes, 2 were rated EF2, 8 rated EF1, and 6 rated EF0.

Historically, these 16 tornadoes rank 2nd all time for the number of tornadoes in the month of December. The record is 19 which occurred during the December of 1988. Additionally, this December 9th event has pushed the yearly total of tornadoes in Mississippi to 109. This will set a new record for the number of tornadoes in a year for the state of Mississippi. The previous record of 99 was set in 2005.