EF0 tornado, Waleska, Georgia, May 20, 2025

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

May 20, 2025

Touchdown

12:09 AM EDT (04:09 UTC)

Lifted

12:13 AM EDT (04:13 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

2.0 miles (3.3 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Cherokee County

Touchdown point

34.322, -84.563

Lift-off point

34.310, -84.531

Record number

2505202209-01

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 EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 85 mph.

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

A loosely organized line of thunderstorms and supercells moved into northwest Georgia during the late evening hours of the 20th. Strong outflow interactions required numerous tornado warnings with multiple reports of winds over 60mph. Storms weakened slightly as they moved through the metro Atlanta, however a couple strong cells redeveloped in the early morning hours of the 21st southeast of the metro. These cells produced large hail, damaging winds, and even a brief tornado.

An EF0 tornado with maximum winds of 75mph touched down just to|the northwest of Waleska late Tuesday night and Early Wednesday just|after midnight at 12:09 EDT. The tornado touched down just|west of Reinhardt College Parkway where a few trees were uprooted|or snapped including Grady Street in Waleska. The tornado|continued ESE paralleling parkway snapping several trees near|houses along the hwy and several across the hwy. The tornado|continued ESE crossing the intersection of Land Road and Darby|Roads continuing to down several trees along the hwy near homes. |The last point of damage discovered was behind a home on|Reinhardt College parkway before Hobart Smith Road. While|limited, radar data suggests that this tornado evolved as a|bookend vortex as a result of a strong surge in wind just to the|southwest of the area in a rural portion of NW Cherokee County.

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

15 minutes of warning. NWS FFC issued a tornado warning for this county at 03:54 UTC, 15 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 04:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 23:31 UTC and running to 05:52 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 00:50 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 Atlanta radar (KFFC), 106 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:08 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 2025 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

38 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.