EF0 tornado in Worcester County, Massachusetts

Tornado August 23, 2021 · Worcester County, Massachusetts

EF0

Rating

0.1 mi

Path length

50 yd

Path width

$2K

Damage as recorded

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

NOAA recorded where this tornado touched down but not where it lifted, so it appears as a point. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF0 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF0 is light damage: shingles and siding peeled, gutters torn, branches broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 65–85 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

In Bolton, a small, brief tornado touched down, causing minor damage between roughly 175 and 198 Main Street. One tree was knocked down onto wires and a large branch was ripped from another tree. It is believed that a funnel cloud initially formed a short distance to the southeast of where the damage was observed, and as it moved northwest, it briefly touched down. Radar data indicated rotation associated with a shower that moved over the area to be very similar to what was observed with the Marlborough tornado a short while earlier.

The wider storm

Tropical Storm Henri made landfall in southwest Rhode Island around noon on August 22nd, then moved slowly northwestward and westward across northern Connecticut and weakened. Henri brought strong wind gusts and flash flooding. The strongest gusts -- to 70 mph -- occurred along the Rhode Island coast. The worst flash flooding occurred in northeast Connecticut.

As the remnants of Henri moved eastward across southern New England on August 23rd, it spawned three tornadoes and a waterspout in MA and also it caused some renewed flooding.

The highest rainfall totals over the two-day period ranged from 5 to 6 inches in Hartford and Tolland Counties in northern Connecticut and in Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden Counties in western Massachusetts.

Began near East Bolton (42.4380, -71.5650).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

2 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

EF0 Middlesex County EF0 Middlesex County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 979153. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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