Tornado, Franklin
- When
- July 3, 4:58 PM EST to 5:04 PM EST
- Where
- Franklin County, Heath to Colrain
- Rating
- F1
- Path length
- 4.5 mi
- Path width
- 100 yd
- Property damage
- $50,000
- Coordinates
- 42.670, -72.830
Tornado in Massachusetts, July 3, 1997
A tornado touched down just west of Number Nine Road and then skipped along a path which ended about a mile into northwest Colrain. Many large trees were uprooted or snapped at their mid levels.
Where it happened
Every event with a place to put it. Tap one for its entry below.
- Tornadoes
- Tropical storms and surge
- Floods
- Wind
- Hail
- Winter weather
- Heat and drought
- Cold
- Fire, smoke and dust
- Marine and coastal
- Other
The toll
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $50,000
- Crop damage
- None recorded
- Events
- 1
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
What happened
The episode as NWS BOX wrote it up.
A tornado touched down just west of Number Nine Road and then skipped along a path which ended about a mile into northwest Colrain. Many large trees were uprooted or snapped at their mid levels. A silo was destroyed and part of the roof of an attached barn was peeled back. A hay tractor was flipped over with its wheels in the air. Doors to a garage were blown in and the roof was partially ripped off. The tornado affected mostly wooded terrain and did extensive tree damage when it passed through a state forest. The path width was up to 100 yards. There were no injuries.
The radar
The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
Event by event
1 tornado. Local standard time, as filed.
What these are
- Tornado
- A violently rotating column of air in contact with the ground and extending from a thunderstorm, filed with its path, width and Fujita or Enhanced Fujita rating from the damage survey.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
The same day elsewhere
- Tornadoes and Hail in New York, July 3, 1997
- Tornadoes and Hail in Massachusetts, July 3, 1997
- Tornadoes and Damaging Winds in New Hampshire, July 3, 1997
- Heat in Florida, July 3, 1997
- Tornado and Flash Flooding in Kansas, July 3 to 21, 1997
- Hail in Missouri, July 3, 1997
- Damaging Winds in Vermont, July 3, 1997
- Tornado in Massachusetts, July 3, 1997
- Hail and Damaging Winds in Oklahoma, July 3, 1997
- Damaging Winds in New York, July 3, 1997
- Hail in Missouri, July 3, 1997
- Hail in Missouri, July 3, 1997
More
Every storm in Massachusetts in 1997Every state in 1997This day in weather historyThe tornado archive for Massachusetts, 1997Warnings in Massachusetts, July 1997
Sources
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 5613838.