EF2 tornado, Cluttsville to Buckhorn, Alabama, March 2, 2012

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 mph

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

3. EF2111 to 135 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.

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

EF2

Date

March 2, 2012

Touchdown

10:06 AM CST (16:06 UTC)

Lifted

10:15 AM CST (16:15 UTC)

On the ground

9 minutes

Path length

7.3 miles (11.7 km)

Path width

220 yards (201 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Madison County

Touchdown point

34.850, -86.570

Lift-off point

34.872, -86.445

Record number

1203021006-01

North Alabama experienced a portion of a much larger outbreak of tornadoes and severe weather from the Ohio Valley south through the Tennessee Valley to the Gulf Coast in advance of a strong cold front. The storms came in two waves. The first began during the mid-morning hours when two tornadic supercells developed across north central Alabama. The tornadoes (one EF-3 and one EF-2) tracked rapidly east-northeast across northeast Limestone and northern Madison Counties. ||During the early afternoon, numerous thunderstorms re-erupted across north Alabama, including several supercells. Most of these storms were large hail producers, in one case up to softball sized. Three additional weak tornadoes were spawned in Limestone County. There were also reports of isolated wind damage. One last band of storms rolled through parts of north central and northeast Alabama during the mid evening hours as the cold front moved through.

A tornado crossed from Limestone into Madison County just north of Orville Smith Road where a single wide modular home lost much of its roof and tree were snapped around it. Major structural damage occurred at the intersection of Yarbrough Road and Old Railroad Bed Road. This was one of the worst hit areas around the Harvest community. Damage to homes, mostly collapsed roofs and some exterior wall damage continued east along Yarbrough Road across Bridges Drive and Bedford Lane, just before Wall Triana Blvd. Also in this area, power poles were snapped near the base. Damage continued across State Highway 53 just south of Jeff Road. The tornado snapped and uprooted trees along Quarter Mountain Road, Carters Gin Road, and Beaver Dam Road just before Pulaski Pike. More significant damage bean to be seen along Patterson Lane, between Mount Lebanon Road and Harwell Lane where wood power poles were snapped, numerous trees uprooted and several homes had roof loss. A large metal barn/shed lost it's roof and some of it's walls were collapsed inward. Damage continued along U.S. Highway 231 at Meridianville Middle School where a concrete power pole was snapped an minor roof damage occurred to nearby buildings.||The tornado then strengthened between Hubert Road and Walker Lane along Mitzi Drive. In this area, EF-2 to low end EF-3 damage was found as several single story homes were destroyed with a loss of all walls. Other homes received significant damage with complete loss of roof and failure of exterior walls. Estimated path width in this area was 200-250 yards. Just northeast of this location along Charley Patterson Road, EF-3 damage occurred as 3 brick veneer/cinder block houses were reduced to rubble. The tornado continued to produce significant damage along Butler Road just south of Walker Lane where additional concrete power pols were snapped and large oak trees were snapped and uprooted. The damage path continued north of New Market, near Hillsboro, with additional trees snapped and uprooted and some roof shingles were lost to some residences. Damage here suggests the tornado was beginning to weaken. Along Davis Road, just south of Moe Road, numerous trees were snapped or uprooted with severe shingle loss to a house about 200 yards away from the road. Beyond this, the tornado appeared to weaken and lift as it moved across the higher plateau region of extreme northeast Madison County.

A tornado of EF-2 intensity with a peak wind speeds of 130 mph crossed portions of north central into northeast Madison County. The tornado began it's path just south of the Meridianville-Madison County Executive Airport off Meridianville Bottom Road where several trees were snapped. The tornado continued it's path eastward to Buckhorn High School before lifting at a farm across from the school on Winchester Road.||The tornado snapped power poles and lines along Moores Mill Road just north of Darwin Road. The tornado then intensified and destroyed a silo just east of that location before snapping trees and collapsing a barn on Macon Lane. The EF-2 tornado continued east causing significant tree damage and structural loss to residences along Rube Robinson Road and Morning Mist Drive. Most residences experienced roof damage, including loss of shingles and windows blown out. One home on Morning Mist Drive completely collapsed and was torn off it's foundation. The tornado was at it's peak width of about 220 yards at this point, before narrowing to 50 to 100 yards as it re-crossed Rube Robinson Road. The tornado collapsed a roof and barn in this area, then crossed fields for about 1 mile before reaching residents adjacent to Buckhorn High School on Shady Oak Lane ad Maysville Lane. A residence experienced significant damage, with brick walls buckled and a large portion of the roof torn off. A nearby cinder block wall of a garage collapsed.||The tornado then tracked through the Buckhorn High School campus at a width of up to 100 yards. A block building used by the ROTC students adjacent to the stadium collapsed. Several portions of the roof of the high school were torn off. Several cars in the parking lot were moved, twisted, and damaged with some windows blown out. The tornado then crossed Winchester Road and severely damaged a farmhouse, snapped and uprooted trees and strewn debris downwind across an adjacent cotton field where the tornado is believe to have lifted.

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

25 minutes of warning. NWS HUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 15:41 UTC, 25 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 16:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 15:25 UTC and running to 17:40 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 12:59 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), 39 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:07 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 2012 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

69 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 70 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.