EF0 tornado, South Coventry, Connecticut, September 9, 2021

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

September 9, 2021

Touchdown

3:10 AM CDT (08:10 UTC)

Lifted

3:11 AM CDT (08:11 UTC)

On the ground

1 minutes

Path length

0.8 miles (1.2 km)

Path width

75 yards (69 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$40,000

County

Not recorded

Touchdown point

41.750, -72.299

Lift-off point

41.757, -72.288

Record number

2109090210-01

A slow moving cold front, instability ahead of it, and low level wind shear led to a brief, isolated weak tornado in the overnight hours in Coventry, Connecticut.

In Coventry, a short-lived tornado touched down near the intersection of South Street and Pucker Street, downing several large trees in a field. It had a discontinuous path as it traveled to the east-northeast across a wooded area, where it created pockets of tree damage. It then touched down again just north of the intersection of Flanders Road and Nathan Hale Drive, where it damaged power lines and then moved through another wooded area. At least 50 trees were damaged in this area, with many having their tops sheared off. More than a dozen trees were blown down. It appears that the tornado dissipated quickly after that, since no other significant damage was observed farther to the northeast. No homes in the area had any damage. Two residents reported hearing the tornado warning, moving to safety in their basement, and then about 15 minutes later hearing a loud wind that lasted just moments. The tornado is estimated to have been on the ground no more than 90 seconds.

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

20 minutes of warning. NWS BOX issued a tornado warning for this county at 07:50 UTC, 20 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 08:15 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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 04:59 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.

Willimantic (Asos) (IJD), 9 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Boston radar (KBOX), 98 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 08:08 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 2021 tornado in ConnecticutEvery tornado in Connecticut since 1950Warnings in force in Connecticut nowThe forecast where you are

1 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.