EF2 tornado, Cuba to Lilita, Alabama, February 3, 2022

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

February 3, 2022

Touchdown

12:52 PM CST (18:52 UTC)

Lifted

1:15 PM CST (19:15 UTC)

On the ground

23 minutes

Path length

15.5 miles (24.9 km)

Path width

900 yards (823 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Sumter County

Touchdown point

32.356, -88.386

Lift-off point

32.501, -88.183

Record number

2202031252-01

7 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 120 mph.

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

A slow moving cold front moved through Central Alabama during the afternoon and overnight hours on February 3-4. A supercell thunderstorm developed in far eastern Mississippi and produced three EF2 tornadoes as it moved across west Alabama. Additional storms produced 2 EF0 tornadoes in Elmore County. A line of storms stalled along and south of the Interstate 85 corridor, resulting in a period of heavy rainfall and flash flooding. Rainfall totals of 4-6 inches were observed over a 3 hour period.

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in southwest Sumter County and determined that it was consistent with an EF2 tornado, with maximum winds near 120 mph. The tornado began on Jarman Road where some trees were snapped. It continued northeast and quickly reached its maximum intensity near Jemison Street and Campbell Street. At this location, numerous trees were uprooted and a home was shifted off its foundation with collapse of some of its walls. The tornado weakened by the time it crossed County Road 10, but continued to cause timber damage on Johnson Street and Siloam Road. Trees continued to be snapped and uprooted near the intersection of Highway 80 and Highway 17, with a 300 yard wide swath of downed trees reported by a landowner on Rumley Tower Road. The tornado dissipated after crossing County Road 13.

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 18:51 UTC, 1 minute before the tornado touched down, in force until 19:30 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 17:41 UTC and running to 21:32 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 16:15 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 Jackson/Brandon,MS radar (KDGX), 161 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:48 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 2022 tornado in AlabamaEvery tornado in Alabama since 1950Warnings in force in Alabama nowThe forecast where you are

4 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.