EF1 tornado, Carthage to Watertown, Illinois, February 28, 2017

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

February 28, 2017

Touchdown

5:07 PM CST (23:07 UTC)

Lifted

5:09 PM CST (23:09 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

1.5 miles (2.4 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Ogle County

Touchdown point

41.948, -89.310

Lift-off point

41.950, -89.282

Record number

1702281707-01

7 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LOT, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The highest wind the damage implies is 95 mph.

• possible end of track. little damage but small tree debris
• manny snapped trees. looks to all be in same direction. appears to be wider swath of straight line wind.
• numerous snapped uprooted trees
• trees uprooted. no damage to structures. probably wind.

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

The late afternoon into the evening of Tuesday, February 28 brought a favorable setup for severe weather, including strong tornadoes across much of the Mid-Mississippi Valley and Lower Great Lakes regions.There were seven tornadoes confirmed in the NWS Chicago county warning area.Large hail was reported in numerous areas.

The tornado toppled farm equipment, collapsed outbuildings, damaged roofs of homes, and broke large branches out of trees. Straight line winds estimated to be up to 80 MPH produced additional damage 1 to 1.5 miles beyond the tornado path. (Tornado #5 of 7).

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 21:00 UTC and running to 04:00 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 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.

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 2017 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

29 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.