EF1 Tornado — Montgomery, Ohio

2013-10-31 · near Vandalia, Montgomery, Ohio

Event narrative

The tornado touched down just northeast of Interstate 75 at Highway 40, exit number 63 in Vandalia. Initial damage consisted of the collapse of a cinderblock drive through store, and significant destruction of the roof and some of the cinderblocks on an uninhabited commercial building. This structure also had large plate glass windows blown in. Additional significant roof damage occurred to a neighboring business, as well as the snapping of some power poles. The tornado continued on to a restaurant, in which the windows were blown in and significant faade and roof damage occurred. Eight people inside the restaurant sustained minor injuries from glass. In the restaurant parking lot, there were numerous vehicles which had windows blown out, with some vehicles shifted or pushed from their parked location. There was a large pickup truck which was lifted and tossed, landing on top of another vehicle. The tornado continued into a residential subdivision, where at least 3 homes sustained damage which rendered them uninhabitable. There were additional homes with partial wall collapses and more than half the roof removed. Other homes had holes in the roof due to being impaled by debris. There was also significant damage due to large trees being snapped off and damaging the homes. Large portions of roofing and sheds were carried at least a city block. The tornado then lifted while in the residential subdivision. Based on the damage surveyed, the maximum wind speed of this tornado was estimated to be between 100 and 110 miles per hour.

Wider weather episode

A potent low pressure system moved across the region, bringing strong winds aloft across the Ohio Valley. Showers that developed along and ahead of a cold front associated with this storm system were capable of producing damaging winds and isolated weak tornadoes. This line of showers producing the damage across southwestern Ohio continued past midnight on October 31st and into the early morning hours of November 1st.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (39.8929, -84.1861)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 477818. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.