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EF2 tornado in Campbell County, Virginia

Tornado April 15, 2018 · Campbell County, Virginia

EF2

Rating

20.4 mi

Whole path

100 yd

Path width

Injuries

$20.0M

Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Campbell County → Lynchburg (c) County → Amherst County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 100 yards (0.06 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

This is the first segment of a tornado that touched down just south of Waterlink Road near Timberlake in Campbell County at 6:00 PM EST. The tornado uprooted trees, damaged multiple roofs from homes, damaged several businesses, and flipped several cars. A total of 28 buildings suffered damage, and five of those buildings were completely destroyed. The tornado crossed Timberlake Road and exited Campbell County at 6:03 PM EST. It would continue into the western portion of the independent city of Lynchburg and further northward into Amherst County.

The wider storm

A strong cold front with a negatively-tilted upper level trough approached southwest Virginia. Plenty of wind shear with modest instability made conditions ripe for large hail, damaging winds, and tornadoes. The thunderstorms ahead of the cold front became strong enough to produce six tornadoes across portions of southwest Virginia. While the first tornado originally formed in Caswell County of North Carolina and crossed into Virginia, the other five all touched down in Virginia. These tornadoes caused significant damage within the cities of Danville and Lynchburg and within the town of Elon in Amherst County. It is the first time ever since storm data records began in 1950 that a tornado struck inside the city limits of Lynchburg.

Began near Timberlake (37.3264, -79.2410).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

EF1 Caswell County EF1 Craig County EF1 Bedford County EF1 Campbell County EF0 Amherst County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 748628. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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