EF2 Tornado — Stewart, Tennessee

2021-12-10 to 2021-12-11 · near Henry, Stewart, Tennessee

Event narrative

This major, long-track EF-3 tornado first touched down in Newbern near Washington Street in west Tennessee. The tornado moved northeast, uprooting and snapping numerous trees along its path. Several homes had significant roof damage. The tornado initially produced EF-1 damage but while progressing northeast, it continued to strengthen to EF-3 as it approached Dresden. Several buildings and homes in downtown Dresden suffered significant damage or were completely destroyed. The tornado slightly weakened and moved northeast toward Paris Landing and eventually crossed the Tennessee River. 5 people were injured in west Tennessee. The tornado clipped the Fort Donelson National Battlefield area of extreme southeastern Calloway County, Kentucky where it blew down several trees, then crossed the Tennessee River into the Land Between the Lakes area of Stewart County and did massive tree damage to heavily wooded areas uprooting thousands of trees along its path. The tornado struck a well constructed single family brick home near Bear Creek where it took off the roof and top story. It then continued to travel northeast where it passed Indian Branch and Morgan Branch where it continued to uproot trees and destroyed some farm outbuildings, lifted the roofs off of some single and double wide mobile homes and completely flattened some barns and single wide structures. The most widespread and severe damage in Stewart County was between Indian Branch and Morgan Branch to the south of Bumpus Mills. The tornado then continued northeast across the far northwest corner of Fort Campbell Army Base continuing to blow down trees before moving into Kentucky. The tornado received a maximum rating of EF2 in Stewart County, and 4 people were injured. The tornado passed just south of the city of Lafayette, Kentucky where it immediately struck a barn and knocked down several electrical transmission lines. The tornado tracked northeast over mostly open country before causing significant damage to several homes off of Boddie Road and Darnell Road. More significant damage occurred to several homes, farm outbuildings, and structures on Palmyra Road. A mobile home was completely demolished and significant roofing damage was done to a brick home on Herndon Oak Grove Road. As the tornado approached Interstate 24, mostly tree damage was observed with a few structures impacted as well. Once the tornado crossed Fort Campbell Blvd, additional damage to electrical transmission lines was observed including over a dozen wood poles snapped. The tornado continued northeast causing mostly tree damage before completely destroying four tobacco barns and damaging three equipment garages off of Bradshaw Road. Two other buildings were also heavily damaged along with multiple silos destroyed. Damage estimates were in the millions according to the owners for just this one farm. The tornado then took straight aim for the city of Pembroke where significant tree damage was observed along with multiple houses with roof damage. Once the tornado moved out of Pembroke, two mobile homes were completely destroyed with the occupants injured. The tornado then crossed into Todd County where mostly tree damage and damage to farm/outbuildings were observed. The tornado then lifted just before impacting the city of Elkton where straight-line winds became dominant. The tornado received a maximum rating of EF2 in Christian County and EF1 in Todd County, and 4 people were injured. The next tornado then touched back down just to the east across the Todd/Logan County line. Total path length of this tornado was around 123 miles.

Wider weather episode

One of the worst tornado outbreaks ever recorded in the United States struck the Midwest, Ohio Valley, and Tennessee Valley from the evening hours on December 10 into the morning hours on December 11, 2021. Across Middle Tennessee, a total of 16 tornadoes were determined to have touched down, making this the 5th largest tornado outbreak on record in Middle Tennessee. These tornadoes injured 8 people across Middle Tennessee and caused millions of dollars in property and tree damage in many counties. These tornadoes, combined with the 5 tornadoes that occurred just a few days earlier across Middle Tennessee on December 6, 2021, set a new record for the number of tornadoes during the month of December. In addition, many counties that had tornadoes in December 2021 had never recorded a tornado in the month of December before, including Stewart, Humphreys, Cheatham, Wilson, Trousdale, Overton, Pickett, Coffee, and Grundy Counties.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (36.5028, -88.0451)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 999321. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.