EF4 Tornado — Winn, Louisiana

2010-11-29 · near Atlanta, Winn, Louisiana

Event narrative

Numerous trees were snapped near the intersection of Collier and Water Well Roads. The tornado then crossed Gum Springs Road, where it completely destroyed one well-built two story brick home and an adjacent brick garage. The home was approximately 4000 sq. ft in size, built in 1997, and its destruction was the basis of the EF-4 rating. Many of the nearby trees were completely snapped, with several near the home snapped off at the base. One single wide mobile home was also destroyed, with its remnants blown into a wooded area about 300 yards away. Another nearby home was moderately damaged, while two other homes suffered minor damage. The tornado then crossed into an open field, before entering a heavily wooded area, traveling northeast across Highways 84 and 167, where sporadic minor tree damage was observed just west and north of Winnfield. Maximum winds are estimated around 170 mph, with a maximum width of 400 yards.

Wider weather episode

A potent...upper level short wave accompanied a prefrontal feature during the afternoon hours of November 29th across north central Louisiana. These thunderstorms developed in a weakly unstable airmass across the region. However...there was strong wind shear present...especially in the lowest 3 kilometers of the atmosphere. A broken line of thunderstorms developed across east central Texas into northwest Louisiana along the prefrontal trough axis. These thunderstorms quickly became supercells. One of these storms produced a significant tornado in Winn Parish which traveled northeast and dropped again in southern Ouachita Parish. Other storms downed powerlines in northwest Louisiana and minor flooding problems.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (31.7947, -92.8080)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 263493. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.