EF1 tornado, Mt Hope to Speake, Alabama, March 19, 2018

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

March 19, 2018

Touchdown

6:18 PM CDT (23:18 UTC)

Lifted

6:22 PM CDT (23:22 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

6.8 miles (10.9 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Lawrence County

Touchdown point

34.423, -87.253

Lift-off point

34.416, -87.134

Record number

1803191718-01

80 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS HUN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

• bleacher damage to football stadium. 100 yards away
• bleachers moved back a few feet
• grain silos overturned and blown 150 yards
• coil of large rubber hose vaulted about 250 yards

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

An isolated supercell produced hail during the early afternoon hours across far northwest and north central Alabama. By mid afternoon, a cluster of supercells developed in northern Mississippi and tracked east-southeast through much of north Alabama through the early evening hours. Two main supercell clusters produced multiple tornadoes and very large hail. Tornadoes ranged in strength from EF-0 to EF-2. The largest hail fell in Cullman County, with widespread and severe damage reported as a result. The largest hail stone reported to the National Weather Service was 5.25 inches in diameter weighing 8.9 ounces.

A tornado touched down on Spruell Farm on County Roads 35/36 in western Lawrence County. At this location, several small fertilizer containers were blown over, and one was blown for more than 1000 yards to the east-southeast. Further east in Mount Hope, trees were uprooted and branches snapped along County Road 23 between Mount Hope Baptist Church and Mount Hope School. Minor damage was noted to the bleachers at Mount Hope School as they were dragged a couple of feet from their original location. EF-0 damage was assessed at these locations with a maximum wind here of 80 mph.

A tornado produced a cluster of damage near the intersection of Highway 36 and County Road 183. Farther east-southeast, trees were snapped and uprooted along the path near Speake School on Highway 36 just south of the intersection of County Road 81 and Highway 157. Due to the trees snapped at this location, the tornado was at its peak intensity, EF-1, with winds around 100 mph. The path width was approximately 50 yards. From there, the tornado lifted just southeast of Speake.

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

24 minutes of warning. NWS HUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:54 UTC, 24 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:34 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 20:28 UTC and running to 00:31 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 20:00 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), 116 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:20 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 2018 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

19 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.