EF0 tornado, Maple Hill to Union Grove, Alabama, May 25, 2011

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

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

2. EF186 to 110 mph

   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

EF0

Date

May 25, 2011

Touchdown

12:17 AM CDT (05:17 UTC)

Lifted

12:27 AM CDT (05:27 UTC)

On the ground

10 minutes

Path length

7.4 miles (11.9 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Madison County

Touchdown point

34.876, -86.596

Lift-off point

34.925, -86.480

Record number

1105252317-01

Supercells in northern Mississippi transitioned into a quasi-linear convective system (QLCS) which progressed eastward through northern Alabama. The storms produced a few bow echoes and meso-vortices, which spawned a few tornadoes and produced widespread wind damage in northwest Alabama (mainly west of I-65). As the storms progressed eastward, the gust front began to outrun the storms, yet still produced sporadic wind damage.

This tornado, again with peak winds of 85 mph, continued its path from Limestone County along Ready Section Road, snapping and uprooting trees until lifting north of Bethel Road just west of state highway 53.

A tornado with peak winds of 85 mph briefly touched down near Meridianville and skipped northeast snapping and uprooting trees along its path between Hazel Green and New Market. Concentrated damage began near Harwell Lane in a neighborhood off Patterson Lane. Several residences off Harwell Circle had trees snapped and uprooted with some minor structural damage including torn siding and shingles pulled off roofs. Just north and east of this location, circular and convergent patterns were observed in a wheat field approaching Patterson Lane.||The tornado took out numerous trees just east of Highway 231 and north of Steger Road cutting out a path estimated at 25 yards wide and over 200 yards long. Little damage was observed from here to Walker Lane due to open fields. However, as the tornado crossed Walker Lane near Moores Mill Road, numerous large trees were snapped and uprooted between 1759 and 2255 Walker Lane. Additional snapped and uprooted smaller trees were seen just north of the intersection of Walker Lane and Butler Road.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 04:33 UTC and running to 06:35 UTC.

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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 00:57 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), 42 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:16 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 2011 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

93 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 94 of them

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.