EF1 tornado, Sumner to Ty Ty, Georgia, April 13, 2020

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 13, 2020

Touchdown

5:36 AM EDT (09:36 UTC)

Lifted

5:40 AM EDT (09:40 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

3.6 miles (5.8 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$200,000

Counties

Tift and Worth counties

Touchdown point

31.480, -83.700

Lift-off point

31.490, -83.640

Record number

2004130336-01

4 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TAE, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 90 mph.

• Snapped trees in background
• Reports of trees uprooted on Little River Road
• Reports of trees uprooted on Whiddon Milld Rd

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

A strong area of low pressure with sufficient instability and a very strong low level jet affected the tri-state area. A severe squall line crossed the area with numerous reports of wind damage. A couple of tornadoes occurred in south-central Georgia.

A brief tornado touched down just southwest of Highway 82, west of Ty Ty, GA where there was minor structural damage as well as widespread trees being uprooted and snapped. The tornado moved northeast and crossed Highway 82 where a member of the public reported seeing it. It then continued northeast with damage reported on Little River Road and Whiddon Mill Road which was consistent with radar signatures. Thank you to Worth County GA Emergency Management officials in their help in collecting damage points and pictures.

A brief tornado touched down just southwest of Highway 82, west of Ty Ty, GA where there was minor structural damage as well as widespread trees being uprooted and snapped. The tornado moved northeast and crossed Highway 82 where a member of the public reported seeing it. It then continued northeast with damage reported on Little River Road and Whiddon Mill Road which was consistent with radar signatures. Thank you to Worth County GA Emergency Management officials in their help in collecting damage points and pictures.

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

28 minutes of warning. NWS TAE issued a tornado warning for this county at 09:08 UTC, 28 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 09:41 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 07:23 UTC and running to 11:53 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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 05:50 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 Moody AFB radar (KVAX), 92 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 09:34 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 2020 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

67 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 68 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.