EF4 Tornado — Putnam, Tennessee

2020-03-03 · near Ensor, Putnam, Tennessee

Event narrative

An historic, violent EF-4 tornado began in western Putnam County northwest of Baxter and tracked eastward for over 8 miles before lifting near downtown Cookeville, damaging or destroying dozens of homes and businesses, killing 19 people, and injuring 88 others. The tornado began 2.5 miles northwest of Baxter along Highway 70 where it caused EF-0 damage to several homes and outbuildings. Scattered trees were blown down as the tornado continued eastward across Gainesboro Highway. The tornado quickly intensified to EF-2 in the Prosperity Pointe subdivision just north of Highway 70 and further strengthened to EF-3 as it crossed Bloomington Road and Clemmons Road in the Double Springs community, severely damaging several homes. As the tornado moved across Charleston Square, Plunk Whitson Road, and North McBloom Chapel Road, it intensified even more and produced a 0.8 mile long by 100 yards wide swath of EF-4 damage. 17 well-constructed, large homes in this area were completely leveled, mostly on Hensley Drive, with many deaths occurring in this area. EF-4 damage continued eastward to Echo Valley Drive, where an apartment complex and 5 more homes were completely destroyed. The tornado weakened to EF-3 as it crossed Highway 70 and Locust Grove Road, where numerous more homes and buildings were damaged or destroyed. A dashcam video of the tornado was taken from an unoccupied vehicle on Willow Brook Drive in this area. Continuing along Highway 70, the tornado weakened further to EF-2 intensity as it crossed County Farm Road and Jackson Street, then down to EF-1 strength along Crescent Drive and Buck Avenue. The tornado rapdily dissipated as it entered the downtown area of Cookeville, quickly lifting on Laurel Avenue just west of Cookeville Regional Medical Center. This was the worst tornado on record to affect Putnam County.

Wider weather episode

From the late evening hours on March 2 into the early morning hours on March 3, supercell thunderstorms developed and spawned tornadoes across southeast Missouri, southern Kentucky, Tennessee, and central Alabama. One of these supercells formed near the Mississippi River in west Tennessee, then tracked eastward across the entire length of the state just north of the Interstate 40 corridor, spawning 10 tornadoes and dropping large hail bigger than the size of baseballs. Seven of these tornadoes touched down across Middle Tennessee, resulting in widespread damage, 307 injuries and 24 fatalities. An additional fatality and 2 more injuries occurred in Benton County in west Tennessee. These tornadoes were the worst seen in Tennessee since the devastating tornadoes of April 27, 2011 across east Tennessee, as well as the Super Tuesday tornadoes of February 5-6, 2008. Total damage estimates from the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency across Middle Tennessee reached $1.6 billion.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (36.1715, -85.6628)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 883016. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.