EF3 Tornado — Noxubee, Mississippi

2011-01-01 · near Mc Leod, Noxubee, Mississippi

Event narrative

Initial damage was numerous snapped hard and softwood trees along E. Spann Road. The tornado moved northeast and caused significant damage to a dairy farm on Paulette Road. Numerous buildings were destroyed including a barn, a milk house, a silo, and a mobile home. The tornado also uprooted large trees and snapped several power poles. A horse trailer tumbled for approximately 100 yards. Debris was scattered approximately one mile to the northeast. The tornado continued on and destroyed a metal farm building and an office off of Stan Tabor Road and also pushed an 18 wheeler approximately 25 yards. The second story of a home was destroyed along with a metal building just off of Hwy 14. Numerous trees were snapped at this location with one tree being completely debarked.

The tornado continued on and destroyed some metal buildings at a pig farm and also overturned a pivot. A barn was destroyed along with roof damage to a home along Stoke Williams Road. The tornado ended near Koehn Road where a few trees were snapped. The tornado was rated EF-3 based on the damage to the dairy farm and the metal building off of Stan Tabor Road. The remainder of the damage was generally EF-1 in nature. Maximum winds were around 140 mph.

Wider weather episode

A potent storm system brought a prolonged outbreak of severe thunderstorms to the Lower Mississippi Valley region from the afternoon hours of New Years Eve lasting through the morning hours of New Years Day. This rare combination of high instability and wind shear is mainly what supported the large outbreak that included multiple strong tornadoes. National Weather Service storm survey teams found 11 total tornadoes that occurred during this event. Of the 11, two were EF-3 and two were EF-2. Six were EF-1 with one EF-0. Damaging straight line winds also brought down numerous trees and large limbs across the area. Large hail also occurred during the event with reports ranging from quarter to golf ball size. In addition, flash flooding was a significant issue across the area. Roads were flooded in several locations, some vehicles were submerged in flood waters, and a few evacuations took place as a result of rising flood waters.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (33.0609, -88.4640)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 272720. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.