EF1 tornado, Besworth to Foster Xrds, Alabama, April 5, 2017

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

April 5, 2017

Touchdown

8:39 PM CDT (01:39 UTC)

Lifted

8:43 PM CDT (01:43 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

2.0 miles (3.2 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Chambers County

Touchdown point

33.004, -85.540

Lift-off point

33.005, -85.506

Record number

1704051939-01

14 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 90 mph.

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

April 5th was a very active severe weather day across central Alabama. During the pre-dawn hours, a warm lifted northward into south central Alabama. Supercells formed along the advancing warm front, producing numerous reports of large hail and a few reports of wind damage and isolated tornadoes. A second round of severe storms developed during the afternoon and evening as an upper level short wave trough approached the area from the west.

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in northwestern Chambers County and determined that the damage was consistent with an EF1 tornado, with maximum sustained winds near 90 mph. The tornado touched down along CR 116 just west of the Union Hill community where several trees were uprooted and large branches were snapped. The tornado continued east, crossing CR 123, where a barn sustained minor damage and several additional trees were snapped. Adjacent to CR 123 and CR 53, a small fire station, barn and additional trees sustained significant damage. The tornado lifted just beyond CR 53, east of Union Hill where more trees were observed to have minor damage.

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

4 minutes of warning. NWS BMX issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:35 UTC, 4 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 02:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 18:57 UTC and running to 01:59 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:19 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.

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 2017 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

23 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.