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EF1 tornado in Upson County, Georgia

Tornado January 11, 2020 · Upson County, Georgia

EF1
Rating
0.3 mi
Path length
100 yd
Path width
$200K
Damage as recorded
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 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

A National Weather Service survey team found that an EF-1 tornado with peak winds of 90 mph and a maximum path width of 100 yards began along the Flint River on the Meriwether-Upson County line south-southeast of Woodbury. The tornado traveled about a third of a mile along the north shore of the river in Upson County with no damage on the Meriwether County side of the river. Approximately 100 trees and several power poles were snapped or blown down. A camper was blown over and a boat was blown into a tree. A home along the river was knocked off of its stilts and destroyed by a large tree falling on it. At least one other home sustained damage from falling trees. [01/11/20: Tornado #3, County #1/1, EF-1, Upson, 2020:003].

The wider storm

A strong cold front associated with a deep upper-level trough moved through the region. A line of strong to severe thunderstorms ahead of the cold front swept into northwest Georgia during the afternoon and progressed southeastward across north and central Georgia through the late afternoon into the evening before weakening and pushing into south Georgia and the Carolinas during the early morning hours. Numerous reports of damaging thunderstorm winds and a few isolated tornadoes were received.

Began near Hendricks (32.9134, -84.5255).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 875804. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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