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Smithville Tornado (2011)

Tornado April 27, 2011 · Itawamba County, Mississippi

EF5
Rating
37.3 mi
Whole path
1,320 yd
Path width
23
Deaths
137
Injuries
$14.4M
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Monroe County → Itawamba County → Marion County, Alabama → Franklin County, Alabama; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 1,320 yards (0.75 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF5 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF5 is incredible damage: strong frame houses swept off their foundations, concrete structures critically damaged, consistent with estimated gusts of over 200 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

A violent tornado moved northeast from Monroe County, Mississippi into Southeast Itawamba County. The tornado weakened as it moved through Itawamba County. Numerous trees and power lines were knocked down. One home sustained roof damage. The tornado continued northeast and crossed over into Marion County, Alabama.

The wider storm

A stationary front remained draped across Southern Missouri into Western Kentucky from April 24th, 2011 into April 25th, 2011. A very warm and unstable atmosphere was in place across the Mid-South ahead of the front. A low pressure system developed along the front and interacted with the unstable environment which helped produce several rounds of severe storms into the evening of April 26th, 2011. As a result of the severe storms, the front sank south during the early morning hours of April 27th, 2011 as a secondary low pressure system developed along the front. As a result, another round of severe storms fired during the afternoon hours ahead of the low pressure center. Additional severe storms fired along the trailing cold front. Tornadoes, large hail, damaging winds, flash flooding occurred as a result of the severe storms.

Began near New Salem (34.0891, -88.3600).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 303563. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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