EF1 tornado, Selmaville to Salem, Illinois, March 31, 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 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

March 31, 2023

Touchdown

8:11 PM CDT (01:11 UTC)

Lifted

8:18 PM CDT (01:18 UTC)

On the ground

7 minutes

Path length

6.0 miles (9.6 km)

Path width

250 yards (229 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$2.0 million

County

Marion County

Touchdown point

38.602, -88.998

Lift-off point

38.629, -88.893

Record number

2303311911-01

29 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LSX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 105 mph.

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

Ahead of a strong cold front, discrete supercells developed and rapidly moved northeast across the region during the early afternoon. Then as the front moved through the activity became more linear before moving out by late evening. There were numerous reports of large hail, damaging winds and two tornadoes.

At 8:11 PM CDT, a tornado touched down to the southwest of Salem, IL, near the intersection of Selmaville Rd and Lowery Ln. There it damaged several trees before moving through a forested area. The tornado then moved through a neighborhood, resulting in more tree damage, roofing and siding damage to a number of homes, and the collapse of a newly built large garage. Next, the tornado intensified as it moved through the southern portion of Salem, IL, damaging several homes, businesses, and numerous trees. This includes significant damage to the roof and walls of a commercial building and a home that was shifted off of its foundation. The tornado continued east of town, moving through a golf course and more wooded areas before approaching U.S. Highway 50 east of Salem. As the tornado crossed the highway, it collapsed a large outbuilding before quickly dissipating. Overall, the tornado was rated EF1 with a max wind speed of 105 mph. The path length was 5.95 miles with a max path width of 250 yards. No deaths or injuries were reported.

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

3 minutes of warning. NWS LSX issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:08 UTC, 3 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:30 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 17:31 UTC and running to 03:00 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 01:04 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.

Salem/Leckrone (SLO), 3 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Evansville,IN radar (KVWX), 113 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:10 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

126 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 127 of them

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.