EF2 tornado, Beamington to Radford, Illinois, August 6, 2023

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

EF2

Date

August 6, 2023

Touchdown

6:09 PM CDT (23:09 UTC)

Lifted

7:03 PM CDT (00:03 UTC)

On the ground

54 minutes

Path length

25.3 miles (40.7 km)

Path width

450 yards (411 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Counties

Sangamon and Christian counties

Touchdown point

39.634, -89.570

Lift-off point

39.575, -89.101

Record number

2308061709-01

53 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS ILX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 125 mph.

• Garage door blown in. Hole in roof on southeast side.
• all trees snapped in about a 100 wide path.
• Half the house destroyed. Debris on slab. Other debris blown to east into trees.
• Out building loss of most of roof and insulation blown east.

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

A vigorous short-wave trough interacted with an approaching low pressure system and associated warm frontal boundary to trigger clusters of strong to severe thunderstorms across west-central Illinois during the late afternoon of August 6th. Due to enhanced low-level wind shear along and north of the warm front, many of the cells began rotating and spinning up occasional funnel clouds. One of the cells intensified as it pushed into Sangamon County, producing a long-track tornado that was on the ground for over 25 miles from just north of Pawnee in far southeastern Sangamon County to southeast of Stonington in Christian County. The tornado produced EF-1 damage along much of its path, peaking with EF-2 damage just south of Willeys in Christian County. This particular thunderstorm cell dropped 2-inch diameter hail north of Taylorville and went on to produce a downburst with 80 mph wind gusts in far eastern Shelby County near Lake Mattoon. The storms eventually congealed into a line as they pushed into eastern Illinois later in the evening, with scattered wind damage, hail, and flash flooding.

A tornado touched down 3 miles north of Pawnee at 6:09 PM CDT. It caused minor roof damage and blew down several trees before it crossed into Christian County just north of the intersection of Pawnee-New City Road and Skaggs Road at 6:13 PM CDT.

This tornado crossed from Sangamon County into far western Christian County just north of the intersection of Pawnee-New City Road and Skaggs Road at 6:13 PM CDT. It continued east-southeastward across Sangchris Lake, damaging a home near the lakeshore and causing extensive tree damage before passing just north of Tovey and Kincaid. The tornado crossed Route 29 southeast of Sharpsburg and tracked over mainly open fields between Routes 29 and 48. It then strengthened and caused EF-2 damage 2 miles south of Willeys along 1600 East Road just south of 1600 North Road where it demolished about 2/3 of a house. The tornado continued east-southeastward, then dissipated near North 2300 East Road about a half mile north of 1500 North Road at 7:03 PM CDT.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 20:16 UTC and running to 01:15 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 19:58 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.

Taylorville (TAZ), 8 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The Lincoln radar (KILX), 61 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:07 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 2023 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

9 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.