EF1 tornado, Murphree Place, Alabama, June 5, 2014

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

June 5, 2014

Touchdown

4:34 PM CDT (21:34 UTC)

Lifted

4:36 PM CDT (21:36 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.7 miles (1.2 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Limestone County

Touchdown point

34.714, -86.976

Lift-off point

34.713, -86.963

Record number

1406051534-01

A long-lived thunderstorm complex which originated in the central Plains during the early morning hours arrived in the Tennessee Valley during the mid to late afternoon hours. This system produced numerous wind damage reports and even a brief, isolated tornado.

This survey was performed by a student at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. A very brief tornado touched down just west of Griffith Road near Tanner. Damage occurred to three residences. At one residence, a 18 by 20 foot shed was destroyed and a few shingles were peeled off the east-facing side of the roof. The two houses across the street sustained minor roof damage (at the time of the survey, one house had already been repaired). A few snapped limbs and branches were noted from trees behind these homes. The tornado crossed Stewart Road where another house sustained minor roof damage and a porch pillar was pushed over. The tornado briefly reached maximum intensity along Winfred Drive where three residences were affected. Two of the residences sustained minor roof damage in the form of shingles and the soffit and fascia being pulled off. The third residence featured significant removal of shingles as well as a destruction of a large well-constructed 30 by 45 foot shed. The tornado dissipated after crossing Winfred Drive, with no additional damage noted along U.S. Highway 31.

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.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 19:27 UTC and running to 22:59 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 21:25 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), 84 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:31 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 2014 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

9 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.