EF1 tornado, Mills, Georgia, April 28, 2014

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 28, 2014

Touchdown

11:05 PM EDT (03:05 UTC)

Lifted

11:10 PM EDT (03:10 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

3.4 miles (5.5 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$30,000

County

Whitfield County

Touchdown point

34.951, -84.872

Lift-off point

34.988, -84.832

Record number

1404282105-01

10 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FFC, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 107 mph.

• 16000 chickens dead. chicken coop just up road from house.
• old chicken house in initial pics,chicken coop also destroyed.
• Older chicken coop, was not being used as chicken coop at this time.
• Chicken coop collapsed. generator was still running the morning after.

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

A broad closed upper low over the Midwest dropped Southeast on the 28th and 29th, with several shortwaves rotating around the larger low. Several rounds of showers and thunderstorms developed across the area as a result. A strong cold front moved through the Southeast on the 29th, finally pushing the system out of the Southeast, but not before scattered severe thunderstorms and isolated flash flooding occurred from the widespread 2 to 6 inches of rain that fell over northwest Georgia. Two weak tornadoes also occurred with this system.

A National Weather Service survey team determined that a short-lived EF-1 tornado touched down in northern Whitfield County. Numerous trees were downed, one on a truck. A chicken house collapse and another outbuilding was destroyed. Minor roof damage was also noted along the path. The tornado continued into Bradley County, Tennessee, before lifting.|[04/28/14: Tornado #2, County #1-1, EF1, Whitfield, 2014:005].

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 01:01 UTC and running to 06:56 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 00:59 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.

The Northeast Alabama radar (KHTX), 112 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:04 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 2014 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

52 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.