EF2 tornado in Barbour County, Alabama

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in southeast Barbour County and determined that it was consistent with an EF2 tornado, with maximum winds near 130 mph.

The tornado formed in a wooded area west of Lee Parker Lane, just north of Highway 131 and to the northeast of the town of Baker Hill. The tornado tracked northeastward uprooting trees and causing minor roof damage to two residences along Five Mile Road. It continued to snap trees as it tracked through a wooded area. The tornado crossed Highway 131 near Leroy Road where two residences and a mobile home suffered minor damage. The tornado intensified as it crossed Highway 431 with the most significant damage in the Country Club of Alabama neighborhood, along the south side of Pebble Beach Drive. Large sections of roofs were removed from a few well built residences with collapse of some exterior walls. The tornado crossed the Walter F. George Reservoir along the Chattahoochee River and continued into Quitman County in Georgia.

A strong upper level disturbance caused a wave of low pressure to form along a quasi-stationary front and move eastward along the Highway 80 and Interstate 85 corridors. This allowed a warm front to lift northward across the southeast portions of Central Alabama. North of the warm front, a line of showers with sporadic lightning strikes along an inverted trough was able to produce damaging winds despite a cool and stable air mass at the surface, knocking down numerous trees from Tuscaloosa County to Randolph County during the first part of the morning. A QLCS ahead of the cold front moved eastward later in the morning from Lowndes County to Barbour County, producing sporadic damaging winds. Additionally, bookend vortices and embedded supercell structures several weak tornadoes and one strong tornado.