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EF2 tornado in Christian County, Kentucky

Tornado February 24, 2011 · Christian County, Kentucky

EF2
Rating
5.7 mi
Path length
300 yd
Path width
$600K
Damage as recorded
EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 300 yards (0.17 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF2 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF2 is considerable damage: roofs torn off well-built houses, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, consistent with estimated gusts of 111–135 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

Several barns were levelled, and several grain bins were destroyed. A grain bin was carried over two-thirds of a mile. One of the destroyed barns was 20 by 150 feet. There were some homes with primarily roof damage or loss of shingles. Windows were blown out. Dozens of trees were uprooted or snapped. At least ten power poles were snapped, and debris and electrical lines were across roads. State Route 91 was closed for an extended period of time. The tornado lifted as it crossed Highway 109 just a couple of miles northwest of Hopkinsville. Peak winds were estimated near 115 mph. The average path width was 225 yards.

The wider storm

A powerful mid-level shortwave trough ejected east-northeast across the southern Plains, reaching the lower and mid Mississippi Valley during the night. In the lower levels, a low intensified as it tracked from Oklahoma into southern Missouri during the day, then across the Lower Ohio Valley in the evening. To the east of the low, a warm front advanced northward to the Lower Ohio Valley. Storms moving east-northeast evolved into an extensive QLCS (quasi-linear convective system) that produced scattered wind damage and a few tornadoes. Preceding the QLCS, widespread heavy rain accompanied the warm front.

Began near Gracey (36.8956, -87.6180).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

2 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 278691. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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