EF4 Tornado — Winston, Mississippi

2014-04-28 · near Zama, Winston, Mississippi

Event narrative

This tornado first touched down in northeastern Leake County, where the damage was mostly downed trees. As the tornado approached the 4 corners intersection of Leake, Attala, Neshoba, and Winston Counties, it strengthened and began to impact structures. Several mobile homes, medal buildings and single family homes were damaged or destroyed in this area along Highway 25. The tornado continued northeast impacting rural areas of southwest Winston County. There it intensified and began to produce EF3 and some areas of EF4 damage. Numerous homes were destroyed, trees were debarked and severe damage occurred to several chicken farms. The EF4 damage in this area was a building reduced to a slab and a chicken farm that was completely wiped away.

At this point, the tornado made a turn to a more northerly course and continued to cause EF2 and EF3 damage just south of Louisville. The tornado entered the city of Louisville on the south side along Highway 15 and continued north-northeast through the east side of the city. Widespread EF3 and EF4 damage occurred in this area. Of particular note, several industrial buildings were destroyed and an area of homes and apartments was destroyed, a few of them being completely taken down to the slab.

The tornado continued through the east side of Louisville causing mainly EF3 damage. Of particular note, the Winston Medical Center received heavy damage and became incapable of use. The tornado continued moving north-northeast roughly along McCullough Road causing EF3 and EF4 damage. Numerous homes had their roofs and walls removed and some were reduced to slabs. Near the intersection with Louisville-Brooksville Road, two particularly well built homes were very heavily damaged and received EF4 ratings.

From this point, the tornado began to weaken, causing mainly EF2 and EF3 damage along North Columbus Avenue. As it approached a second intersection with Highway 25, the tornado lifted after traveling on the ground for over 34 miles.

Wider weather episode

A powerful spring storm system brought a multi-day severe weather outbreak across a large portion of the country during the April 27-30 time frame. This outbreak started across the Central Plains on the 27th and slowly migrated eastward over the following two days. A large tornado outbreak occurred across the Lower MS River & TN River Valleys on the 28th. The event was capped on the 30th with additional severe weather and a historic flash flooding/heavy rain event along the AL, FL gulf coast where rainfall totals peaked between 15-25 inches!

Across the NWS Jackson, MS forecast area, the tornado outbreak on the 28th was the main event. This event was driven by a classic severe weather pattern with a strong fast moving jet stream and a deep surface cyclone over the central plains. These features helped to produce strong wind shear in the atmosphere which in turn combined with rich gulf moisture and setup a volatile atmospheric mix. Multiple supercell thunderstorms developed during the afternoon/evening and produced many instances of damaging wind and large hail along with multiple tornadoes. The most devastating tornado was the EF-4 which tore a path across NE Leake, the corners of Attala/Neshoba counties, and through the heart of Winston County where the city of Louisville was especially hard hit. This tornado was on ground for 34.3 miles and resulted in 10 fatalities and many injuries. Other hard hit counties were Lowndes, Rankin, Hinds, Scott, Newton, Montgomery, Warren and Jones. Each of these counties experienced at least one tornado, some multiple tornadoes. Overall, 21 tornadoes were confirmed across the forecast area. Of these tornadoes, 3 were rated EF-3, 3 rated EF-2, 12 rated EF1 and 2 rated EF-0.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (32.9320, -89.3067)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 508158. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.