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EF2 tornado in Washington County, Alabama

Tornado April 15, 2011 · Washington County, Alabama

EF2
Rating
0.9 mi
Path length
150 yd
Path width
1
Injury
$50K
Damage as recorded
EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 150 yards (0.09 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

The tornado touched down near Highway 17, moving east and widening to 150 yards. East of Highway 17 the tornado lifted a single story wood frame home off of its concrete masonry unit pier foundation and rolled it about 100 yards. The home disintegrated as it was blown or rolled to the northeast. Trees were snapped, twisted and blown over in a 150 yard wide path to the east. One person inside the home was seriously injured with several broken ribs.

The wider storm

Numerous supercell thunderstorms developed in the late morning through the evening hours across Mississippi and Alabama. A series of long track tornadic supercell thunderstorms moved out of southeast Mississippi in the late morning, and crossed southwest Alabama in the late morning through the afternoon and evening hours. In southwest Alabama, the tornadoes missed the larger populated towns and communities, but did produce significant damage to numerous homes in rural areas. Several injuries were reported with 3 fatalities in Deer Park, Alabama (Washington County) from an EF-3 tornado during the early evening hours. Widespread damage to timber along several 200 to 600 yard-wide tornado paths resulted in significant losses to the timber industry. The Alabama Forestry Commission estimated timber losses in southwest Alabama to be near 7.3 million dollars.

Began near Yarbo (31.5510, -88.2820).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 297476. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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