EF0 tornado, Kingsboro, Georgia, April 15, 2011

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

April 15, 2011

Touchdown

7:50 PM EDT (23:50 UTC)

Lifted

7:51 PM EDT (23:51 UTC)

On the ground

1 minutes

Path length

0.4 miles (0.7 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$5,000

County

Harris County

Touchdown point

32.695, -84.858

Lift-off point

32.696, -84.850

Record number

1104151750-01

A deep, slow moving, negatively tiltled and highly diffluent upper trough was sweeping from the south central into the southeast U.S. during the April 15th and 16th period. A strong Pacific cold front accompanied the upper-level trough. An unseasonably warm, moist and unstable air mass was present across the southeast U.S. in advance of this weather system. An initial line of strong to severe thunderstorms began to move into northwest Georgia during the late afternoon hours of April 15th. As the line progressed further into the state, it evolved more in a large area of showers and thunderstorms with discrete supercells across especially central Georgia. These supercells produced damaging winds, hail, and three tornadoes. As the event continued into the early morning hours of the 16th, the severity decreased, but widespread rain and thunderstorms, along with isolated severe thunderstorms continued until around daybreak. In addition to the severe weather events, the prolonged and heavy rain event resulted in flash flooding along north Atlanta metropolitan area creeks and streams.

A damage survey conducted by the National Weather Service Forecast Office in Peachtree City confirmed that a brief EF0 tornado touched down approximately five miles southeast of Hamilton and tracked east-northeast just 0.43 mile before lifting. The maximum path width was 50 yards with maximum wind speeds of 75 mph. Ten trees along the path of the tornado were topped. In addition, a gazebo and storage shed were destroyed by the tornado. While there was widespread damage to trees and power lines across much of the county, other than the damage noted along this brief path, all of the other damage was the result of strong thunderstorm wind gusts and not a tornado.||[04/15-04/16/11: Tornado #1, County #1-1, EF0, Harris, 2011:007].

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

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk, with a 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 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.

Columbus Metro Airport (CSG), 22 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Atlanta radar (KFFC), 79 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:49 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2011 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

74 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 75 of them

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.