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EF0 tornado in Wayne County, North Carolina

Tornado April 16, 2011 · Wayne County, North Carolina

EF0
Rating
20.4 mi
Whole path
400 yd
Path width
60
Injuries
$30.0M
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Wayne County → Lenoir County → Greene County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 400 yards (0.23 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF0 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF0 is light damage: shingles and siding peeled, gutters torn, branches broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 65–85 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

The tornado touched down just east of North Beston Road, between Guy Smith and Old Jason Roads. Tornado damage was mostly minor, consisting mainly of siding shingle damage and isolated tree damage. The end section of a farm building was blown down and heavily damaged along Parkstown Road just west of the Greene County line. This portion of the tornado was rated EF0 with winds around 80 mph. The tornado eventually strengthened to an EF3 as it moved into Greene County.

The wider storm

A strong storm system that had a history of producing deadly tornadoes across Oklahoma and the deep south on the 14th and 15th weakened as it crossed the southern Appalachians during the early morning hours of the 16th. A squall line descended the Blue Ridge by the late morning hours, and rapidly intensified

as it moved east into the central Piedmont of North Carolina, with four long live tornadic supercells evolving from the linear convective segment. These tornadic supercells went on to produce 9 tornadoes in the Raleigh CWA, including 2 EF3s, and 4 EF2s. The tornadoes left 8 dead with approximately 275 injuries.

Began near Bests (35.3636, -77.8427).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

EF3 Wake County 6 deadEF3 Cumberland County 1 deadEF2 Bladen County 3 deadEF2 Harnett County 1 deadEF2 Person CountyEF2 Halifax CountyEF2 Wilson CountyEF1 Alamance CountyEF1 Johnston County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 296306. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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