EF0 tornado, Twin to Whitehouse, Alabama, November 29, 2016

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

November 29, 2016

Touchdown

7:29 PM CST (01:29 UTC)

Lifted

7:43 PM CST (01:43 UTC)

On the ground

14 minutes

Path length

10.6 miles (17.1 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Marion County

Touchdown point

34.000, -87.875

Lift-off point

34.099, -87.738

Record number

1611291929-01

54 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS BMX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 93 mph.

• Start point of Chicken Foot Rd EF-1 Tornado. Tree down, minor damage to garage.
• numerous hardwoods and pines uprooted and snapped
• chicken house roof damaged. wooden shed roof significant damage.
• Much more tree damage here than the point farther south. This is probably closer to the center line.

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

A warm front moved northward during the day on Tuesday, November 29th, and surface temperatures climbed into the 70s across north Alabama. Low level shear and storm relative helicity increased over west Alabama Tuesday evening and discrete supercells developed over west Alabama.

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in southern Marion County near Twin and determined that the damage was consistent with an EF-0 tornado, with maximum winds estimated near 75 mph.||The tornado touched down about 3 miles north of Gu-Win, or just southwest of the Twin Community on County Road 250. The tornado damage was light and mainly consisted of tree and tree branch damage northeastward across County Road 3, Alabama Highway 253 and up to Interstate 22. The tornado proceeded northeastward and crossed County Road 95, County Road 36 and Vinston Road. More tree and tree branch damage was done on this part of the path. The tornado then passed Piney Grove Road, Alabama Highway 129 and lifted near County Road 170. More light tree damage occurred and a few outbuildings sustained damage in this area.

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

1 minute of warning. NWS BMX issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:28 UTC, 1 minute before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:54 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 23:37 UTC and running to 02:50 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 00:51 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.

Haleyville (1M4), 32 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The Columbus AFB radar (KGWX), 51 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:29 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 2016 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

21 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.