Tornadoes · United States · Alabama · 2005
F2 tornado, Pansey, Alabama, March 22, 2005
This F2 tornado ran 3.0 miles across Houston County on March 22, 2005, touching down at 12:13 PM CST and reaching 200 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 4, and did $750,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
F040 to 72 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
F2113 to 157 mphthis tornado
Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.
F3158 to 206 mph
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
F5261 to 318 mph
Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.
Unrated
The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.
The record
- Rating
- F2
- Date
- March 22, 2005
- Touchdown
- 12:13 PM CST (18:13 UTC)
- Path length
- 3.0 miles (4.8 km)
- Path width
- 200 yards (183 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 4
- Property damage
- $750,000
- County
- Houston County
- Touchdown point
- 31.100, -85.170
- Lift-off point
- 31.130, -85.120
- Record number
- 26
What the Weather Service recorded
A tornado touched down about a half mile west of Firetower Road. As it traveled northeast, it destroyed three barns on County Road 81, and destroyed two large homes just north of Turnpike Road. Four people were injured and transported to a hospital in Dothan. Several mobile homes were damaged, with numerous trees and power lines down. The storm survey was conducted by the NWS Tallahassee WCM and SOO.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
30 minutes of warning. NWS TAE issued a tornado warning for this county at 17:43 UTC, 30 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 18:15 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 14:51 UTC | 15:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TAE |
| 15:30 UTC | 15:56 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TAE |
| 17:43 UTC | 18:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | TAE |
| 18:14 UTC | 18:45 UTC | Tornado Warning | TAE |
Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.
The forecast that day
The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:19 UTC.
SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.
The air that afternoon
The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.
Tallahassee Rgnl, FL (KTLH), 12:00Z
6.2 hours before the tornado, 113 km from the path. March 22, 2005.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 714 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -75 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 375 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 508 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 55 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 20 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 169 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 265 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.9
- Supercell composite
- 7.3
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.1 K/km
Tallahassee Rgnl, FL (KTLH), 00:00Z
5.8 hours after it, 113 km from the path. March 23, 2005.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1417 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -8 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1529 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 545 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 36 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 28 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 157 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 238 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 1.3
- Supercell composite
- 6.6
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.3 K/km
The surface observations
Mariana (MAI), 31 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16:18 UTC | 66.2 | 64.4 | 0° 0 kt | 1010.8 | ||
| 16:30 UTC | 66.2 | 64.4 | 100° 3 kt | 1010.5 | ||
| 16:53 UTC | 68 | 65 | 110° 5 kt | 1009.8 | ||
| 17:44 UTC | 71.6 | 66.2 | 130° 8 kt | 1008.1 | ||
| 17:53 UTC | 73 | 68 | 150° 11 kt | 18 | 1008.1 | VCTS RA |
| 18:53 UTC | 75 | 69 | 180° 12 kt | 1006.4 | VCTS | |
| 19:54 UTC | 71 | 68 | 250° 15 kt | 24 | 1006.8 | +TSRA BR |
| 20:01 UTC | 71.6 | 69.8 | 240° 16 kt | 25 | 1006.1 | +TSRA FG |
| 20:09 UTC | 71.6 | 68 | 330° 9 kt | 25 | 1007.1 | +TSRA BR |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2005 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of March 22, 2005
10 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 22 | 7:06 AM CST | F0 | Lincoln, MS | 1.0 | 50 | $40,000 | ||
| March 22 | 8:33 AM CST | F1 | Jones, MS | 5.0 | 100 | $800,000 | ||
| March 22 | 1:32 PM EST | F3 | Seminole, GA | 18.0 | 1,250 | 1 | 18 | $7.0 million |
| March 22 | 2:30 PM EST | F0 | Coffee, GA | 3.0 | 100 | |||
| March 22 | 3:01 PM EST | F1 | Mitchell, GA | 3.8 | 100 | $250,000 | ||
| March 22 | 3:10 PM EST | F1 | Colquitt, GA | 3.7 | 100 | $120,000 | ||
| March 22 | 4:25 PM EST | F2 | Wayne, GA | 2.0 | 880 | |||
| March 22 | 5:10 PM CST | F0 | DeSoto, MS | 1.0 | 75 | $50,000 | ||
| March 22 | 5:13 PM CST | F1 | DeSoto, MS | 0.1 | 50 | 1 | $150,000 | |
| March 22 | 5:38 PM CST | F0 | Mississippi, AR | 8.0 | 75 | $10,000 |
What this means
Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.