EF0 Tornado — Lewis, Tennessee

2021-03-25 · near Napier, Lewis, Tennessee

Event narrative

A strong EF-2 tornado touched down just northeast of the city of Waynesboro between Highway 64 and Highway 99. The tornado increased in intensity rapidly as it tracked through neighborhoods along Highway 99. A few trees and outbuildings were blown down and destroyed at the beginning of the track before the tornado moved across Steele Street, Hassell Drive, High Street, and Natural Bridge Road, taking the roofs off several homes and causing one minor injury. Five high power TVA electrical steel poles were bent to the ground in this area, knocking out power to all of Wayne County. Continuing northeastward, the tornado destroyed a barn on York Road and damaged several homes on Fortyeight Creek Road. The tornado then moved through rural, forested and hilly terrain with few roads for a total of 22.2 miles across northeast Wayne, extreme southern Lewis, and extreme northwestern Lawrence Counties, blowing down hundreds of trees before finally lifting around 4 miles northwest of Summertown.

Wider weather episode

A potent weather system on March 25, 2021 led to an outbreak of supercells and tornadoes across Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee, some of which were strong to violent. Across Middle Tennessee, a left-moving or anticyclonic supercell caused dozens of reports of large hail and wind damage from the Nashville metro northward to the Kentucky border during the afternoon. Later in the evening, additional supercell thunderstorms developed and spawned three tornadoes in Wayne, Lewis, Lawrence, and Rutherford Counties, as well as more reports of hail and wind damage.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (35.4578, -87.4116)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 950351. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.