Tornadoes in Tennessee, May 31, 2001

Name: Tornadoes in Tennessee, May 31, 2001
Start: 2001-05-31T16:45
End: 2001-05-31T19:15
Location: Tennessee

May 31, 2001 · NWS OHX · 2 events in 2 counties and zones

2 tornado, as filed by the National Weather Service.

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

Open the live radar over this ground

The toll

Deaths: 1
Injuries: 2
Property damage: $100,000
Crop damage: None recorded
Events: 2

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 forecasters said that day

The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.

NWS Nashville, TN wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at May 31, 1:16 PM CST, 3 hours 29 minutes earlier.

Area forecast discussion, May 31, 1:16 PM CST, 3 hours 29 minutes before

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NASHVILLE TN
145 PM CDT THU MAY 31 2001

FIRST MAJOR FEATURE...H5 LOW OVER IOWA MOVING SLOWLY NORTHEAST WITH
A SHORTWAVE TROUGH THAT EXTENDS SSW THROUGH THE LOWER PLAINS. 2 VORT
FEATURES AHEAD OF THE TROUGH...ONE LOCATED IN THE MEMPHIS AREA AND
THE SECOND ...LESS DEFINED CENTER...IS LOCATED OVER SOUTH CENTRAL
TEXAS. THE CONVECTION OVER WEST TENNESSEE APPEARS TO BE ASSOCIATED
WITH THE VORT CENTER IN THE MEMPHIS AREA.

THE SECOND MAJOR FEATURE...WELL DEFINED H5 LOW OVER
SASKATCHEWAN-MANITOBA BORDER DROPPING SOUTHEASTWARD. MOVEMENT TO THE
SOUTHEAST SHOULD INCREASE AS THE IOWA LOW CONTINUES TO MOVE
NORTHEAST.

AT THE SURFACE...SURFACE LOW IS LOCATED JUST NORTHWEST OF ST LOUIS
MOVING EASTWARD AT 15 KT. A WARM FRONT EXTENDS FROM THE LOW EAST-SOUTHEAST
INTO EASTERN KENTUCKY. THE ASSOCIATED COLD FRONT EXTENDS SOUTHWESTWARD
THROUGH THE LOWER PLAINS INTO NORTH TEXAS.

MODEL PUSH THE SURFACE LOW NORTHEASTWARD INTO THE GREAT LAKES DRAGGING
THE COLD FRONT THROUGH THE MIDSTATE LATER TONIGHT AND EARLY FRIDAY
MORNING. AS THE SASKATCHEWAN LOW DROPS OUT OF CANADA A SECOND FRONT
MOVES TOWARD THE MIDSTATE ON SATURDAY WITH WINDS TURNING BACK TO THE
NORTHWEST BY SATURDAY EVENING. ONLY A BRIEF RESPITE AS ANOTHER SYSTEM
MOVES OUT OF THE PLAINS SUNDAY AND MONDAY.

FWC POPS AND TEMPS LOOK VERY REASONABLE. SELS OUTLOOKED A SLIGHT CHANCE
OF SEVERE. ORIGINALLY THOUGH THAT THIS MIGHT HAPPEN TODAY...BUT...
MORNING CLOUDINESS HAS HELD DOWN TEMPS AND IT LOOKS LIKE WE WONT
DESTABILIZE ENOUGH THIS AFTERNOON...AND...THE WIND PROFILE IS NOT
REALLY CONDUCIVE TO SEVERE. AS THE FRONT APPROACHES TONIGHT...THE WIND
PROFILE SHOULD IMPROVE AND THERE IS THE POSSIBILITY OF ISOLATED SEVERE
IN THE PRE-FRONTAL CONVECTION. MODELS ARE ONLY PREDICTING ABOUT 20-30KT
OF 0-3 KM SHEAR OVERNIGHT. THUS...I DONT THINK THAT THIS IS ENOUGH OF A
POSSIBILITY TO MENTION IT IN THE ZONE PACKAGE.

BNA BE 063/075 060/075 055 18822
CSV EE 062/070 055/070 050 18951

.BNA...NONE.

JLM

The radar

The Nashville radar (KOHX), 83 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the first event began at 22:46 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment

Event by event

2 tornado. Local standard time, as filed.

Tornado, Hickman

When: May 31, 4:45 PM CST to 4:46 PM CST
Where: Hickman County, 4 mi WSW of Bon Aqua
Rating: F1
Path length: 0.7 mi
Path width: 50 yd
Property damage: $20,000
Reported by: NWS STORM SURVEY
Coordinates: 35.933, -87.400

Most of the destruction was on Bee Branch Road. A mobile home was destroyed. It sat on a ridge located at 10095 Bee Br. Rd. The storm also destroyed an empty trailer. The trailer was used as a work area. 2 barns were destroyed. A calf was hurled 100 yards, and a white deck chair was carried a quarter of a mile from the property of Mr. and Mrs. Buchanon on Bee Branch Road.

Tornado, Cannon

When: May 31, 7:05 PM CST to 7:15 PM CST
Where: Cannon County, 6 mi WSW of Auburntown
Rating: F2
Path length: 6.3 mi
Path width: 440 yd
Deaths: 1 direct, 0 indirect
Injuries: 2 direct, 0 indirect
Property damage: $80,000
Reported by: NWS STORM SURVEY
Coordinates: 35.917, -86.200

The heaviest damage was at Marshall Creek Road. 2 homes were also damaged on Hughes Road. A farm house...where there was one fatality...was demolished on Marshall Creek Rd. There was destruction to a 2 story Cape Cod home, built in 1998, across the street. Bradley Jackson, age 64, was eating dinner when the tornado struck. His wife went into a closet. She was injured. Mr. Jackson was sucked out of his home and slammed against a silo 100 yards away and was killed. The couple's daughter Mrs. Felicity Vaughter, who lived across the street in a modular home, was injured. The modular home was ripped up and blown 30 to 50 yards. A washing machine landed on Mrs. Vaughter and paralyzed her. She was 3 months pregnant and lost her baby.

The people who died

As the offices recorded each death: direct deaths were caused by the weather itself, indirect ones by something it set in motion.

Event	Date	Age	Sex	Where	Kind
Tornado, Cannon	2001-05-31	64	Male	Permanent Home	Direct

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

Every storm in Tennessee in 2001 Every state in 2001 This day in weather history The tornado archive for Tennessee, 2001 Warnings in Tennessee, May 2001

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: 5249656, 5249745.