EF2 tornado, Midfield to Grasselli, Alabama, December 25, 2015

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

December 25, 2015

Touchdown

4:55 PM CST (22:55 UTC)

Lifted

4:59 PM CST (22:59 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

0.9 miles (1.5 km)

Path width

280 yards (256 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

2

County

Jefferson County

Touchdown point

33.443, -86.914

Lift-off point

33.445, -86.899

Record number

1512251655-01

15 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS BMX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 130 mph.

• starting point, fencing down near car by church parking lot.
• 2x4 through car. also roof taken off of house next to car.
• uprooted trees, residential debris and power lines.

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

A low level boundary across southeast Alabama became the focus for heavy rainfall and severe weather during the early morning hours of December 24th. As the boundary lifted northward, the focus for heavy rainfall and severe weather shifted into north central Alabama.

NWS meteorologists determined a tornado touched down in the city of Midfield with a fairly brief, but wide damage path, with a core of concentrated significant damage. Initial damage was found near Cairo Avenue, where trees were toppled and snapped. This damage was rated at EF-1 intensity. The tornado then tracked northeast, where EF-2 damage occurred along Jefferson Avenue SW and Park Avenue SW, bounded by 50th Street to the south and 49th Street to the north. Here, residential homes were heavily damaged, with two homes flattened. Many trees were also snapped and uprooted. A rapid decline in intensity was observed as the tornado moved northeast, with EF-1 and EF-0 damage consisting of roof damage and snapped/uprooted trees stretching from Grasselli Avenue SW to Carver Avenue SW and 45th Street SW. There were a total of about 50 homes impacted, with approximately 15 that were uninhabitable.

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

31 minutes of warning. NWS BMX issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:24 UTC, 31 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:00 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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:25 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 Birmingham radar (KBMX), 33 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:53 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 2015 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

3 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.