EF0 tornado, Ocee to Sinclair Lake, Georgia, November 30, 2016

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

November 30, 2016

Touchdown

2:07 PM EST (19:07 UTC)

Lifted

2:13 PM EST (19:13 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

2.9 miles (4.7 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$16,000

Counties

Forsyth and Fulton counties

Touchdown point

34.090, -84.234

Lift-off point

34.116, -84.193

Record number

1611301307-01

17 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 80 mph.

• 2 large pine trees uprooted and pointed east to west
• Tree damaged in median of Windward Pkwy
• Large limb down..misc debris
• Small branches downed. End of track

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

A strong cold front associated with a deep and sharp upper-level trough swept through the state accompanied by a line of thunderstorms. Despite only marginal instability; ample deep-layer shear and a strong low-level jet resulted in several reports of damaging winds and tornadoes with these thunderstorms. The early morning hours tornado that occurred in Catoosa County was actually associated with a supercell. The other tornadoes were associated with a Quasi-Linear Convective System (QLCS) during the late morning/afternoon hours of the 30th.

A National Weather Service storm survey team found that an EF0 tornado with maximum winds of 80 MPH moved along a path with a maximum width of 100 yards for 1.10 miles across portions of northern Fulton County. The tornado began along Windward Parkway where two pine trees were uprooted. The tornado moved northeast to McGinnis Ferry Road where it crossed into Forsyth County. [11/30/16: Tornado #5, County #1/2, EF0, Fulton, 2016:011].

A National Weather Service storm survey team found that an EF0 tornado with maximum winds of 80 MPH moved along a path with a maximum width of 100 yards for 1.86 miles across portions of Forsyth County. The tornado crossed into Forsyth County from Fulton County along McGinnis Ferry Road where several trees were snapped or uprooted and traveled northeast. A traffic light was damaged at the intersection of McFarland Parkway and Currie Drive and more trees were snapped or uprooted along the path before the tornado ended along Ridgefield Drive. [11/30/16: Tornado #5, County #2/2, EF0, Forsyth, 2016:011].

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

29 minutes of warning. NWS FFC issued a tornado warning for this county at 18:38 UTC, 29 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 19:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 17:06 UTC and running to 20:24 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:12 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.

Atlanta/Dekalb (PDK), 27 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Atlanta radar (KFFC), 88 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 19:09 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 2016 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

16 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.