Alert archive / South Carolina / Tornado Warnings
Tornado Warnings in South Carolina, 2009
49 tornado warnings in 2009. An alert counts here when it covered any part of the state, so the counties below add up to more than the state. The archive of tornado warnings reaches back to 1986.
Tornado Warnings by county
Each county as a circle sized by its count in 2009. Tap one for its archive.
- Tornado Warnings
- 49
- Busiest month
- April13 tornado warnings
- Busiest day
- April 11, 20099 tornado warnings
Over time
By month
Warning verification
How often warnings here had a storm report inside them, and how much warning the reports had.
11 of 49 tornado warnings covering South Carolina in 2009 had a tornado report inside them; 16 of 19 tornado reports fell inside a warning, on average 15 minutes after it went out.
South Carolina, 2009
| Warnings | With a report | False alarm ratio | Reports | Inside a warning | Mean lead time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tornado warnings | 49 | 11 | 78% | 19 | 84% | 15 min |
Each office's whole area, 2009
| Warnings | With a report | False alarm ratio | Reports | Inside a warning | Mean lead time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NWS Greenville-Spartanburg, SC: tornado warnings | 33 | 8 | 76% | 15 | 93% | 21 min |
| NWS Columbia, SC: tornado warnings | 18 | 3 | 83% | 6 | 50% | 25 min |
| NWS Wilmington, NC: tornado warnings | 8 | 1 | 88% | 3 | 33% | 8 min |
| NWS Charleston, SC: tornado warnings | 27 | 4 | 85% | 9 | 78% | 10 min |
An office's figures cover every county it serves, including across state lines.
Verified by the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's Cow, which matches each storm-based warning with the local storm reports inside its polygon while it was in force, within 15 km of its edge: a tornado warning counts as verified on a tornado report, a severe thunderstorm warning on hail of 1 inch or more, a gust of 58 mph or more, or wind damage, a flash flood warning on a flash flood report. The false alarm ratio is the share of warnings with no such report; "inside a warning" is the probability of detection, the share of reports that fell inside one; lead time runs from the warning's issue to each report inside it, counting zero for a report that came first. A warning with no report is not proof nothing happened: reports come from spotters, the public and damage surveys, and are thin where few people live.
The alerts
Every alert, in the order issued. Times are local, Eastern Time. Each opens its own page with the text, the map, the radar and the sounding.
| Issued | Product | Office | Counties | Lasted |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 1, 3:10 AM EST | Tornado Warning | CHS | Beaufort, Jasper | 38 min |
| Mar 28, 5:05 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Clarendon, Orangeburg | 55 min |
| Mar 28, 5:43 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Beaufort, Jasper | 47 min |
| Mar 28, 6:39 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | ILM | Florence | 36 min |
| Apr 10, 6:24 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Oconee | 51 min |
| Apr 10, 7:05 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Pickens | 39 min |
| Apr 10, 7:08 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Anderson, Oconee | 56 min |
| Apr 10, 7:56 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Anderson, Greenville, Laurens | 49 min |
| Apr 10, 8:01 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville, Anderson | 44 min |
| Apr 10, 8:12 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville | 48 min |
| Apr 10, 8:41 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Greenwood | 34 min |
| Apr 10, 10:41 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Aiken | 34 min |
| Apr 10, 11:12 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Aiken, Barnwell, Orangeburg | 48 min |
| Apr 10, 11:51 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Bamberg, Calhoun, Orangeburg | 39 min |
| Apr 11, 12:05 AM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Barnwell | 40 min |
| Apr 11, 12:24 AM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Allendale | 36 min |
| Apr 11, 1:12 AM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Barnwell | 48 min |
| May 4, 5:29 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Greenwood, Laurens | 30 min |
| May 4, 5:56 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Newberry | 49 min |
| May 4, 6:36 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Fairfield, Newberry | 39 min |
| May 4, 7:08 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Fairfield | 37 min |
| May 5, 5:49 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Laurens, Spartanburg, Union | 41 min |
| May 5, 6:23 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Laurens, Spartanburg, Union | 52 min |
| May 5, 11:05 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | McCormick | 25 min |
| May 5, 11:23 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville, Greenwood | 52 min |
| May 5, 11:31 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Edgefield, McCormick | 44 min |
| May 6, 4:19 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Cherokee | 41 min |
| May 28, 7:58 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Kershaw | 25 min |
| May 28, 8:07 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CAE | Chesterfield, Kershaw | 38 min |
| Jun 14, 4:09 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Charleston | 26 min |
| Jun 16, 5:50 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Cherokee, York | 40 min |
| Jun 16, 6:14 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Chester, York | 61 min |
| Jun 16, 6:29 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Cherokee, York | 40 min |
| Jun 16, 6:48 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Cherokee, Spartanburg, Union | 42 min |
| Jun 16, 7:04 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Chester | 29 min |
| Jun 17, 10:52 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | ILM | Dillon, Marlboro | 20 min |
| Jun 17, 11:06 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | ILM | Darlington, Florence, Marlboro | 20 min |
| Jun 18, 6:01 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | GSP | Cherokee, Chester, Union, York | 18 min |
| Jun 27, 7:08 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Charleston | 25 min |
| Jun 27, 7:17 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Berkeley, Charleston, Dorchester | 43 min |
| Jul 5, 10:14 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Allendale, Hampton | 30 min |
| Jul 29, 4:20 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Beaufort | 40 min |
| Oct 27, 7:33 PM EDT | Tornado Warning | CHS | Jasper | 42 min |
| Dec 2, 2:49 PM EST | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville | 41 min |
| Dec 2, 3:24 PM EST | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville, Greenwood, Laurens | 40 min |
| Dec 9, 5:18 AM EST | Tornado Warning | GSP | Abbeville, Greenwood, Laurens | 42 min |
| Dec 9, 5:57 AM EST | Tornado Warning | CAE | Fairfield, Newberry | 48 min |
| Dec 9, 1:42 PM EST | Tornado Warning | CHS | Jasper | 33 min |
| Dec 9, 2:06 PM EST | Tornado Warning | CHS | Beaufort, Jasper | 24 min |
By county
Every county with at least one alert. A county page lists each alert that covered it.
- Laurens County6
- Abbeville County6
- Jasper County5
- Greenwood County5
- Cherokee County5
- Beaufort County4
- Union County4
- York County4
- Orangeburg County3
- Anderson County3
- Barnwell County3
- Newberry County3
- Fairfield County3
- Spartanburg County3
- Charleston County3
- Chester County3
- Florence County2
- Oconee County2
- Aiken County2
- Allendale County2
- McCormick County2
- Kershaw County2
- Marlboro County2
- Clarendon County1
- Pickens County1
- Greenville County1
- Bamberg County1
- Calhoun County1
- Edgefield County1
- Chesterfield County1
- Dillon County1
- Darlington County1
- Berkeley County1
- Dorchester County1
- Hampton County1
The busiest days
Days with the most alerts issued, by UTC date.
Nearby
Alerts in force nowTornadoes on recordThe radar archive20082010
Sources
National Weather Service watches, warnings, advisories and statements from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's VTEC archive, which reconstructs tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and marine warnings back to 1986 from the NWS text archive. Storm Prediction Center watches and mesoscale discussions from SPC's archive through the Mesonet. County centers from the US Census Bureau. Warning verification from the Mesonet's Cow. Rebuilt daily.