EF1 tornado, Dempsey, Georgia, January 4, 2015

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

January 4, 2015

Touchdown

11:55 AM EST (16:55 UTC)

Lifted

11:57 AM EST (16:57 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.3 miles (0.5 km)

Path width

120 yards (110 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$3,000

County

Dodge County

Touchdown point

32.224, -83.240

Lift-off point

32.225, -83.235

Record number

1501041055-01

8 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 95 mph.

• Concrete footings only 4 inches thick and sat on top of ground. Erosion from heavy rain had washed away top soil that likely covered the footings in the past.
• Six large pines snapped narolly missing cars and homes. Part of fence destroyed.
• Part of attic vent removed.
• 3 Large pines snapped and blocked Antioch Church Rd.

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

A strong surface low associated with a deep upper-level trough lifted out of the lower Mississippi Valley and swept across the southern Appalachians the evening of January 3rd through the morning of January 4th producing heavy rain and flash flooding, severe thunderstorms and isolated tornadoes.

An NWS survey team found that the same storm that produced two brief tornadoes in Pulaski County produced a brief EF1 tornado in central Dodge County. The tornado, with maximum wind speeds of 95 MPH and a maximum path width of 120 yards, touched down southwest of the intersection of Log Cabin Road and Antioch Church Road and traveled just 0.32 miles through the intersection before dissipating. Around a dozen trees were downed narrowly missing homes and cars. [01/04/15: Tornado #3, County #1-1, EF1, Dodge, 2015:003].

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 16:37 UTC and running to 18:15 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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:05 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.

Eastman (EZM), 10 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Robins AFB radar (KJGX), 51 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:53 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 2015 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

10 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.