EF1 tornado in Cherokee County, South Carolina

Tornado May 22, 2020 · Cherokee County, South Carolina

EF1

Rating

21.4 mi

Whole path

200 yd

Path width

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Cherokee County → York County → Gaston County, North Carolina; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 200 yards (0.11 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 near the intersection of Tucker Rd and Zayes Rd, crossing S Rutherford, St Oak Grove Rd, and Highway 5 before crossing into Kings Mountain National Military Park. Numerous trees and large limbs were snapped and uprooted along the entire path but structural damage was minimal in this largely rural area.

The wider storm

A line of thunderstorms moved into upstate South Carolina from northeast Georgia during the early afternoon and quickly intensified. Multiple reports of locally damaging wind gusts were received, and a weak tornado moved across Kings Mountain State Park and vicinity.

Began near Blacksburg (35.1030, -81.5050).

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 896673. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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