EF1 tornado, Monroe County, 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 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, as surveyed

EF1, preliminary

Date

March 12, 2026

Touchdown

6:20 AM EDT (10:20 UTC)

Lifted

6:23 AM EDT (10:23 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

1.4 miles (2.3 km)

Path width

300 yards (274 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Monroe County

Touchdown point

33.029, -83.944

Lift-off point

33.019, -83.924

Highest wind the damage implies

95 mph

Surveyed by

NWS FFC

Survey last edited

March 18, 2026

Record number

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

Tornado damage was first observed on Sharp St near the intersection with Jones St, where two large trees were uprooted. These trees brought down power lines and led to outages in the neighborhood. The tornado continued east-southeast, with several more trees being uprooted along Sharp St and in the yards of homes near Hwy 42. Snapped large branches were also observed in the area immediately southeast of this intersection. The tornado then moved southeast between Hwy 42 and Montpelier Ave, where it uprooted about 10 pecan trees in an orchard and snapped about a half-dozen trees across from the intersection of Montpelier Ave and Rowland Ln. This damage was in line with the estimated maximum wind speed of 95 mph and an EF1 rating. Mary Persons High School was narrowly missed by the tornado. From here, the tornado continued southeast, uprooting or snapping several trees on Pecan Cir and at its intersections with Montpelier Ave and Virginia Ave. The tornado continued through this neighborhood, uprooting several large trees at the end of Slippery Rock Pl and another tree on Hickory Pl. The tornado lifted in the woods between just south of Hickory Pl, with no further damage observed.

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

32 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FFC, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 96 mph.

• Roots appeared to be fairly weak
• Two trees uprooted, another with large branches snapped. Facing opposite direction as the ones on Sharp St.
• No damage to barn or nearby house
• Several trunks snapped and a few trees uprooted nearby

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

0 minutes of warning. NWS FFC issued a tornado warning for this county at 10:20 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 11:00 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. 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), 67 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 10:22 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.