TornadoLookup

Home / New Jersey / Cape May

EF1 tornado in Cape May County, New Jersey

Tornado July 9, 2021 · Cape May County, New Jersey

EF1
Rating
0.9 mi
Path length
75 yd
Path width
EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 75 yards (0.04 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

An EF-1 tornado touched down near the entrance of the Ocean World

Condominium complex in Woodbine where it uprooted two cedar trees.

The tornado completely destroyed a picnic shelter at the complex's

park area and spread debris consisting of structural remains and

patio furniture hundreds of feet. The roof of the picnic shelter was

dropped into the nearby swimming pool. The tornado caused considerable

structural damage to the complex's office and recreation building.

The front door was blown out and ripped off of the structure and an

exterior wall was pushed outward several inches, but did not

completely collapse. The complex's entrance sign was also blown over

and another nearby cedar tree was uprooted. The tornado continued

westward where it snapped a few trees along Ash Drive and

Freidriechstadt Avenue. The tornado continued through a wooded area

then uprooted a few trees near the intersection of Dehirsch Avenue

and Joffe Drive. At the same intersection, several tree limbs were

snapped off and sections of residential vinyl fencing was blown

over. The tornado continued across an open area then ended near the

intersection of Heilprin Avenue and Ocean Drive where it snapped

part of a pine tree off onto a house.

The wider storm

Tropical Storm Elsa affected much of the coastal mid-Atlantic on the night of July 8 and into the morning of the 9th. The storm maintained much of its intensity despite a long track over land as it began to interact with a mid-latitude trough. Overall, impacts across the mid-Atlantic were fairly minimal. One to three inches of rain, locally a little higher, fell across a large area, but produced little in the way of flooding impacts. With the center tracking near the coast, tropical storm force wind conditions were limited, and confined mainly to immediate coastal areas. Elsa did produce a couple of short-lived tornadoes over eastern New Jersey. The storm was fast moving, and departed into New England a few hours after daybreak on the 9th.

Began near Woodbine Jct (39.2358, -74.7927).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

1 more tornado the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 959414. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

Tornadoes near your address

See every tornado that passed near a place you know, measured to its path.