EF1 tornado, Orrville to Belle Mina, Alabama, December 24, 2008

1. EF065 to 85 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 mph

   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.

4. EF3136 to 165 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. EF4166 to 200 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. EF5over 200 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.

7. 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.

Rating

EF1

Date

December 24, 2008

Touchdown

3:33 PM CST (21:33 UTC)

Lifted

3:35 PM CST (21:35 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

1.6 miles (2.7 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$200,000

County

Limestone County

Touchdown point

34.662, -86.904

Lift-off point

34.660, -86.876

Record number

0812241533-01

A potent cold front pushed across northern Alabama during the afternoon and evening hours. Intense low level shear and weak instability was present along and ahead of this front. A few severe thunderstorms developed along the front. One of the storms produced a bow echo just north of Decatur which resulted in a brief EF-1 tornado within the comma head of the storm in Belle Mina in Limestone county.

A tornado tracked through the northern portions of the community of Belle Mina on Christmas Eve. The tornado developed in a forested area just east of interstate 65 north of Garrett Road. It toppled trees onto a vehicle being used by hunters. The tornado tracked through a cotton field for about 1/2 of a mile before intensifying to EF-1 strength and destroying two single wide trailer homes. One was lifted off its foundation entirely with debris found several hundred yards downwind. Fortunately, no occupants were in either location. The tornado then tracked into a farmstead along Mooresville Road, completely destroying two large tractor sheds. Two of the adjacent homes sustained minor damage to the roof. Several cedar and cypress trees were either snapped or uprooted. One tree landed atop a vehicle. No injuries occurred. The tornado then crossed Mooresville Road, uprooting and snapping additional trees, and collapsing a small shed onto vehicles. One wall of an old small farmhouse also collapsed. No occupants were in the home at the time.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 20:02 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 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.

The Northeast Alabama radar (KHTX), 79 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:30 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track

Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2008 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.