EF0 tornado, Roundtop to Ellijay Gilmer Co Ar, Georgia, June 5, 2014

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

June 5, 2014

Touchdown

7:21 PM EDT (23:21 UTC)

Lifted

7:24 PM EDT (23:24 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

0.8 miles (1.2 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$50,000

County

Gilmer County

Touchdown point

34.612, -84.553

Lift-off point

34.613, -84.540

Record number

1406051721-01

4 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FFC, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 85 mph.

• Approximately 12 trees either snapped or uprooted with several showing a convergent layout. Main convergent width of damage around 50 yards, while some other more sparadic tree damage was wider (~300 yards).
• Approximately 4 trees were uprooted with one large tree having fallen across the road.
• Start point of damage with either downed or snapped trees.
• Other image of convergent damage that includes two snapped trees to the right of the uprooted tree.

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

A mesoscale convective system pushed through Tennessee early on the 5th, moving into northwest Georgia during the day. While the system itself weakened, it helped to trigger scattered to widespread showers and thunderstorms, several of which became severe with mainly wind damage noted across mainly north Georgia. One weak tornado also occurred in Gilmer County.

A National Weather Service survey team determined that a weak EF-0 tornado touched down just north of Round Top on Old Round Top Road, tracking eastward through the Rolling Meadows subdivision. The tornado nearly paralleled Old Round Top Road. Approximately 20 trees were either snapped or uprooted. A couple of trees were reported to have fallen on a house and some cars.|[06/05/14: Tornado #1, County #1-1, EF0, Gilmer, 2014:008].

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 severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 19:31 UTC and running to 00:37 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 21:25 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 Atlanta radar (KFFC), 139 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:23 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

9 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.