EF2 tornado, Marshallville to Saint Lewis, Georgia, March 12, 2026

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 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 mphthis tornado

   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, as surveyed

EF2, preliminary

Date

March 12, 2026

Touchdown

6:40 AM EDT (10:40 UTC)

Lifted

6:45 AM EDT (10:45 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

4.8 miles (7.7 km)

Path width

600 yards (549 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

2

County

Macon County

Touchdown point

32.464, -83.965

Lift-off point

32.476, -83.885

Highest wind the damage implies

112 mph

Surveyed by

NWS FFC

Survey last edited

March 13, 2026

Record number

None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

A line of storms moved through the region in the early morning hours of March 12, 2026. Several tornadoes were spawned along the line as it moved

east through Central GA. In Macon County a tornado first touched down west of Bryant Hill Road and moved through a large pecan orchard snapping and

uprooting numerous trees. The tornado moved across Bryant Hill road and very rapidly reached max intensity as it approached Sleepy Hollow Road. JGX radar

data also confirms the presence of very strong velocities in the area near Sleepy Hollow Road as well. The tornado struck a mobile home community on the west side

of Sleepy Hollow Road destroying 4 mobile homes, overturning a home and damaging several others. One of the residents of a home was thrown approximately 40 feet from

one of the destroyed homes. In another home, there were 2 injuries as a result of the home being flipped over and destroyed. The overturned mobile home remained intact, however the anchors which were concreted into the ground were pulled out of the ground and hanging from the frame. Numerous trees nearby the community and across the street were snapped. The combination of the damage to the mobile homes and the scope of the tree damage nearby are consistent with high end EF1 to low end EF2 and the basis of the low end EF2 rating for this storm. The tornado continued east toward hwy 49 snapping and uprooting trees. 2 large silos had their tops ripped off with bricks and debris strewn to the all around the area near the silos. The tornado crossed hwy 49 snapping and uprooting trees in a pecan orchard and flipping 3 sections of a center pivot.

As the storm continued east, a weakening trend was noted both on radar and the corresponding damage on the ground with mostly sporadic tree damage across Vegetable Road, County Rd 123 and County road 116. The tornado lifted north of Juice plant road just east of County Road 116.

Written by NWS FFC in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

35 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FFC, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 111 mph.

• Anchors pulled from ground
• a couple trees sporadically downed

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

A strong cold front and associated QLCS system moved through central Georgia in the early morning hours of the 12th. Storms within the line were able to produce a few spots of wind damage, however the main hazard ended up being the numerous short lived and brief spin-up tornados which occurred in central Georgia. The strongest tornado was an EF2 near Marshallville.

The tornado first touched down west of Bryant Hill Road and moved|through a large pecan orchard snapping and uprooting numerous|trees. The tornado moved across Bryant Hill Road and very rapidly reached max intensity as it approached Sleepy Hollow Road. JGX radar data also confirms the presence of very strong velocities in the area near Sleepy Hollow Road as well. The|tornado struck a mobile home community on the west side of Sleepy Hollow Road destroying 4 mobile homes, overturning a home and damaging several others. One of the residents of a home was thrown approximately 40 feet from one of the destroyed homes. In another home, there were 2 injuries as a result of the home being|flipped over and destroyed. The overturned mobile home remained intact, however the anchors which were concreted into the ground were pulled out of the ground and hanging from the frame. Numerous trees nearby the community and across the street were snapped. The combination of the damage to the mobile homes and the scope of the tree damage nearby are consistent with high end EF1 to low end EF2 and the basis of the low end EF2 rating for this storm. The tornado continued east toward Hwy 49 snapping and uprooting trees. Two large silos had their tops ripped off with bricks and debris strewn all around the area near the silos. The tornado crossed Hwy 49 snapping and uprooting trees in a pecan orchard and flipping 3 sections of a center pivot. As|the storm continued east, a weakening trend was noted both on radar and the corresponding damage on the ground with mostly sporadic tree damage across Vegetable Road, County Rd 123 and County road 116. The tornado lifted north of Juice plant road just east of County Road 116.

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

0 minutes of warning. NWS FFC issued a tornado warning for this county at 10:40 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 10:51 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 04:33 UTC and running to 11:34 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, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 05:31 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 Robins AFB radar (KJGX), 58 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 10:40 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 2026 tornado in GeorgiaEvery tornado in Georgia since 1950Warnings in force in Georgia nowThe forecast where you are

23 more have been surveyed in the United States that day, so far.

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.