Tornadoes · United States · Georgia · 2022
EF0 tornado, Statenville, Georgia, March 23, 2022
This EF0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Echols County on March 23, 2022, touching down at 2:53 PM EDT and reaching 25 yards wide. It killed nobody.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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.
The record
- Rating
- EF0
- Date
- March 23, 2022
- Touchdown
- 2:53 PM EDT (18:53 UTC)
- Lifted
- 2:54 PM EDT (18:54 UTC)
- On the ground
- 1 minutes
- Path length
- 0.5 miles (0.8 km)
- Path width
- 25 yards (23 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Echols County
- Touchdown point
- 30.700, -83.064
- Lift-off point
- 30.708, -83.062
- Record number
- 2203231253-01
What the Weather Service recorded
Prefrontal showers and storms began to move into southeast Georgia Wednesday morning. A small intense mesoscale convective system ahead of the cold front moved slowly northeastward from the northeastern Gulf of Mexico into Suwannee Valley late morning into early afternoon. Just before 2 PM EST, an embedded thunderstorm in the convective system produced an EF0 tornado that passed through an area of homes near the intersection of HWY 135 south and Jean circle in Echols county. Multiple reports of roof damage and large tree branches down were observed.
At 1:53 PM EST, an EF0 tornado passed through an area of homes near the intersection of HWY 135 south and Jean circle in Echols county. Damage was reported from multiple sources from the Echols county sheriff department and emergency manager as well as the NWS Jacksonville storm survey. Between Walt road and Jean circle, multiple metal roofs were damaged, uplifted and blown away from sheds, a metal building system, and a couple of single wide mobile homes. Power lines were down along Walt road caused by metal roofing from a shed being blown into the primary lines. A street sign was also pulled from the ground near Jean circle. Multiple hardwood trees along the half mile path had large tree branches broken off.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
8 minutes of warning. NWS JAX issued a tornado warning for this county at 18:45 UTC, 8 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 19:02 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18:45 UTC | 19:02 UTC | Tornado Warning | JAX |
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 forecast that day
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 16:38 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 air that afternoon
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.
Tallahassee Rgnl, FL (KTLH), 12:00Z
6.9 hours before the tornado, 123 km from the path. March 23, 2022.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 290 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -24 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 213 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 490 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 46 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 38 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 346 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 438 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.6
- Supercell composite
- 4.7
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.1 K/km
The surface observations
Valdosta Regional (VLD), 22 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16:53 UTC | 69 | 68 | 160° 3 kt | 1014.2 | +TSRA BR | |
| 16:55 UTC | 160° 2 kt | 1014.2 | +RA BR | |||
| 16:59 UTC | 70 | 68 | 150° 3 kt | 1014.2 | VCTS +RA BR | |
| 17:00 UTC | 0° 0 kt | 1014.2 | RA BR | |||
| 17:05 UTC | 0° 0 kt | 1014.2 | RA BR | |||
| 17:07 UTC | 70 | 69 | 0° 0 kt | 1013.9 | VCTS RA BR | |
| 17:10 UTC | 120° 2 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:15 UTC | 130° 2 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:19 UTC | 70 | 68 | 140° 5 kt | 1014.2 | +RA BR | |
| 17:20 UTC | 150° 5 kt | 1014.2 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:23 UTC | 70 | 68 | 0° 0 kt | 1014.2 | +RA FG | |
| 17:25 UTC | 0° 0 kt | 1014.2 | +RA FG | |||
| 17:30 UTC | 140° 2 kt | 1013.9 | +RA FG | |||
| 17:31 UTC | 70 | 69 | 3 kt | 1013.9 | +RA FG | |
| 17:34 UTC | 70 | 69 | 3 kt | 1013.9 | +RA FG | |
| 17:35 UTC | 230° 2 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:36 UTC | 70 | 69 | 3 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |
| 17:40 UTC | 200° 4 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:45 UTC | 0° 0 kt | 1013.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 17:50 UTC | 180° 4 kt | 1013.9 | RA BR | |||
| 17:53 UTC | 70 | 69 | 180° 4 kt | 1013.9 | RA BR | |
| 17:55 UTC | 160° 5 kt | 1013.9 | RA BR | |||
| 17:57 UTC | 70 | 69 | 170° 5 kt | 1013.9 | RA BR | |
| 18:00 UTC | 170° 5 kt | 1013.5 | RA BR | |||
| 18:05 UTC | 170° 5 kt | 1013.5 | RA BR | |||
| 18:10 UTC | 71 | 69 | 180° 5 kt | 1013.5 | VCTS RA BR | |
| 18:10 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1013.5 | RA BR | |||
| 18:14 UTC | 70 | 69 | 200° 3 kt | 1013.5 | VCTS +RA BR | |
| 18:15 UTC | 200° 2 kt | 1013.5 | +RA BR | |||
| 18:20 UTC | 0° 0 kt | 1013.9 | +RA FG | |||
| 18:23 UTC | 70 | 70 | 220° 5 kt | 1013.9 | VCTS +RA FG | |
| 18:25 UTC | 210° 5 kt | 1013.9 | +RA FG | |||
| 18:30 UTC | 200° 5 kt | 1013.5 | +RA BR | |||
| 18:35 UTC | 170° 10 kt | 1012.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 18:36 UTC | 69 | 67 | 160° 11 kt | 1012.5 | VCTS +RA BR | |
| 18:40 UTC | 130° 11 kt | 1011.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 18:45 UTC | 170° 9 kt | 1012.5 | RA BR | |||
| 18:46 UTC | 69 | 67 | 180° 9 kt | 1012.5 | RA BR | |
| 18:50 UTC | 190° 7 kt | 1012.9 | RA BR | |||
| 18:53 UTC | 69 | 67 | 190° 7 kt | 1012.9 | RA BR | |
| 18:55 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.9 | RA BR | |||
| 19:00 UTC | 180° 9 kt | 1012.9 | +RA BR | |||
| 19:02 UTC | 69 | 68 | 180° 9 kt | 1012.5 | RA BR | |
| 19:05 UTC | 180° 9 kt | 1012.5 | +RA BR | |||
| 19:09 UTC | 70 | 68 | 190° 9 kt | 1012.9 | RA BR | |
| 19:10 UTC | 190° 8 kt | 1012.9 | -RA BR | |||
| 19:15 UTC | 210° 7 kt | 1012.9 | -RA BR | |||
| 19:18 UTC | 69 | 68 | 200° 6 kt | 16 | 1012.5 | -RA BR |
| 19:20 UTC | 200° 8 kt | 1012.9 | -RA | |||
| 19:25 UTC | 210° 5 kt | 1012.9 | -RA | |||
| 19:30 UTC | 200° 5 kt | 1012.9 | -RA | |||
| 19:35 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.9 | -RA | |||
| 19:40 UTC | 190° 7 kt | 1012.5 | -RA | |||
| 19:45 UTC | 180° 8 kt | 1012.5 | -RA | |||
| 19:50 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.5 | ||||
| 19:53 UTC | 69 | 67 | 190° 5 kt | 1012.5 | ||
| 19:55 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:00 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1012.2 | -RA | |||
| 20:05 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1012.2 | -RA | |||
| 20:10 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:15 UTC | 200° 4 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:19 UTC | 70 | 67 | 180° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||
| 20:20 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:25 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:30 UTC | 190° 5 kt | 1012.2 | ||||
| 20:35 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1011.9 | ||||
| 20:40 UTC | 190° 7 kt | 1011.9 | ||||
| 20:45 UTC | 180° 5 kt | 1011.9 | ||||
| 20:49 UTC | 71.6 | 68 | 190° 9 kt | 15 | 1011.9 | |
| 20:50 UTC | 190° 9 kt | 1011.9 |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Moody AFB radar (KVAX), 22 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:51 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.
What was reported nearby
Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18:53 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 2 W Statenville | Echols, GA | CORRECTS PREVIOUS TSTM WND DMG REPORT FROM 2 W STATENVILLE. SHERRIFF DEPARTMENT REPORTED POSSIBLE TORNADO AND DAMAGE TO HOMES WITH TREES DOWN, STREET SIGN PULLED FROM GROUND AND POWER OUTAGE NEAR HWY 135 SOUTH AND JEAN C |
| 18:53 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 2 W Statenville | Echols, GA | SHERRIFF DEPARTMENT REPORTED TREES DOWN NEAR HWY 135 SOUTH AND JEAN CIRCLE. |
| 18:53 UTC | TORNADO | 2 W Statenville | Echols, GA | UPDATE: NWS STORM SURVEY CONFIRMS AN EF0 TORNADO AT THIS LOCATION. PREVIOUS: CORRECTS PREVIOUS TORNADO REPORT FROM 2 W STATENVILLE. CORRECTS PREVIOUS TSTM WND DMG REPORT FROM 2 W STATENVILLE. SHERRIFF DEPARTMENT REPORTED |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2022 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of March 23, 2022
7 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 23 | 3:42 PM EDT | EF0 | Warren, OH | 1.7 | 50 | $12,000 | ||
| March 23 | 5:31 PM EDT | Unrated | Van Wert, OH | 0.3 | 20 | |||
| March 23 | 6:11 PM EDT | EF0 | Huron, OH | 0.8 | 100 | $5,000 | ||
| March 23 | 8:56 PM EDT | EF2 | Pickens, SC | 6.3 | 440 | $250,000 | ||
| March 23 | 9:29 PM EDT | EF0 | Pickens, SC | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| March 23 | 9:45 PM EDT | EF2 | Carroll, VA | 1.9 | 125 | $400,000 | ||
| March 23 | 10:59 PM EDT | EF1 | Alexander, NC | 6.2 | 150 | $25,000 |
What this means
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.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.