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EF1 tornado in Union County, South Carolina

Tornado April 3, 2017 · Union County, South Carolina

EF1

Rating

0.7 mi

Path length

150 yd

Path width

Death

$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 EF1 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF1 is moderate damage: roofs badly stripped, mobile homes pushed off foundations or overturned, windows broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 86–110 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

NWS Storm survey found the path of an EF1 tornado that began around healing springs Church Road and Eaves Road, moving northeast between these Two Roads, then lifting near the intersection of Eaves Rd and old highway 176. A mobile home on Eaves Rd was overturned off its frame and flipped multiple times. A 65-year-old male occupant of the home was killed.

The wider storm

A line of showers and thunderstorms developing ahead of a cold front pushes across Upstate South Carolina during the afternoon. In addition to locally damaging winds, several brief, weak tornadoes touched down, including a fatal tornado in Union County.

Began near Ada (34.5820, -81.6060).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

EF0 Pickens County EF0 Pickens County EF0 Laurens County EF0 Union County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 690887. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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