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EF0 tornado in Smith County, Tennessee

Tornado December 11, 2021 · Smith County, Tennessee

EF0
Rating
7.3 mi
Whole path
75 yd
Path width
$20K
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Smith County → Jackson County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

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 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

This EF-0 tornado touched down on Bright Avenue in South Carthage and moved northeast along the east side of Carthage uprooting several small trees and snapping large tree limbs on Upper Ferry Road, McGinness Avenue, Hillcrest Drive, Skyline Drive, Ridgeway Drive, and Cumberland Mine Road. The tornado then crossed the Horseshoe Bend of the Cumberland River blowing down several trees, then moved across McClures Bend of the Cumberland River and caused tree damage and moderate roof damage to a structure on McClures Bend Lane. The tornado continued east, crossing Sullivan Bend and the Cumberland River yet again before lifting on Waynick Road in Jackson County where it caused minor tree damage. Total path length of this tornado was 7.35 miles.

The wider storm

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.

Began near South Carthage (36.2416, -85.9548).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 999746. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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