Tornadoes · United States · Alabama · 2011
EF1 tornado, Chisholm to Kilby, Alabama, November 16, 2011
From Chisholm to Kilby, this EF1 tornado ran 0.9 miles across Montgomery County on November 16, 2011, touching down at 11:08 AM CST and reaching 75 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $500,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- EF1
- Date
- November 16, 2011
- Touchdown
- 11:08 AM CST (17:08 UTC)
- Lifted
- 11:10 AM CST (17:10 UTC)
- On the ground
- 2 minutes
- Path length
- 0.9 miles (1.4 km)
- Path width
- 75 yards (69 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $500,000
- County
- Montgomery County
- Touchdown point
- 32.387, -86.218
- Lift-off point
- 32.398, -86.211
- Record number
- 1111161108-01
The damage survey
1 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS BMX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 80 mph.
- Damage to several single wide trailers, with undercarriages blown out and outbuildings tossed over. One large tree was uprooted and fell on a vehicle outside of a trailer. The tree was laying to the northeast. Also, hurricane straps were used on most of the trailers, so no trailers were shifted off their foundations. Some spackling of debris was found on a few trailers. A retail building also lost some of its roof across the street from the mobile home park. Path width 75 yds wide.
Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.
What the Weather Service recorded
Several waves of thunderstorms affected Central Alabama on Wednesday, November 16. The airmass ahead of a slow-moving, strong cold front became increasingly moist and unstable during the early morning hours. Rotating supercells within several broken lines of thunderstorms began producing damage just after sunrise in west Central Alabama. Isolated damage continued across the southern portion of the area through the early afternoon. In addition to damage across portions of Alabama, this storm system produced damage from Eastern Texas to the Atlantic Coast.
A tornado touched down near the Alabama Christian Academy Football field in Montgomery, where a large pine tree snapped and collapsed a section of bleachers. The scorebored on the nearby Faulkner University baseball field also collapsed. The tornado continued northeastward crossing Wares Ferry Road, where several homes sustained minor roof damage. Farther to the northeast, the most widespread damage occurred at the Sunshine Valley Mobile Home Park, were numerous mobile homes sustained minor to moderate roof damage or the underpinning was blown out. Small outbuildings and sheds were also blown over in this area, and trees were snapped or uprooted. One large pine tree was uprooted and crushed a vehicle. From there the tornado crossed US Highway 231 and struck Adam's Motorsports, were a section of metal roof was peeled back. The tornado lifted just northeast of Adam's Motorsports.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The surface observations
Maxwell Afb/Montgom (MXF), 14 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 00:00 UTC |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2011 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of November 16, 2011
20 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| November 16 | 2:40 AM CST | EF1 | Saint Helena Parish, LA | 0.5 | 150 | $50,000 | ||
| November 16 | 3:35 AM CST | EF0 | Terrebonne Parish, LA | 0.1 | 25 | $30,000 | ||
| November 16 | 4:11 AM CST | EF1 | Marion, MS | 9.6 | 440 | $300,000 | ||
| November 16 | 5:03 AM CST | EF1 | Jones, MS | 2.2 | 50 | $60,000 | ||
| November 16 | 5:12 AM CST | EF2 | Jones, MS | 12.9 | 300 | 15 | $650,000 | |
| November 16 | 7:07 AM CST | EF2 | Sumter, AL | 1.5 | 600 | 1 | $200,000 | |
| November 16 | 7:32 AM CST | EF0 | Marengo, AL | 2.8 | 250 | $300,000 | ||
| November 16 | 9:00 AM CST | EF0 | Clarke, AL | 0.3 | 50 | $5,000 | ||
| November 16 | 11:52 AM CST | EF2 | Macon, AL to GA | 61.5 | 880 | 4 | $9.5 million | |
| November 16 | 4:25 PM EST | EF0 | Cleveland, NC | 0.3 | 50 | $5,000 | ||
| November 16 | 4:53 PM EST | EF0 | Richmond, GA | 1.1 | 40 | $10,000 | ||
| November 16 | 5:06 PM EST | EF0 | Union, SC | 0.1 | 50 | $1.0 million | ||
| November 16 | 5:30 PM EST | EF1 | Chester, SC | 1.4 | 100 | $20,000 | ||
| November 16 | 5:32 PM EST | EF2 | York, SC | 5.8 | 200 | 3 | 5 | $1.0 million |
| November 16 | 5:34 PM EST | EF1 | Burke, GA | 6.5 | 100 | $200,000 | ||
| November 16 | 5:53 PM EST | EF0 | Aiken, SC | 7.4 | 70 | $20,000 | ||
| November 16 | 6:05 PM EST | EF2 | Davidson, NC | 12.5 | 200 | 2 | 15 | $21 million |
| November 16 | 6:55 PM EST | EF1 | Pittsylvania, VA | 2.6 | 125 | $500,000 | ||
| November 16 | 8:40 PM EST | EF1 | Ware, GA | 0.2 | 200 | $8,000 | ||
| November 16 | 11:14 PM EST | EF0 | Hertford, NC | 1.7 | 50 | $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.