EF2 tornado, Grayson to Brooklyn, Illinois, April 2, 2024

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

April 2, 2024

Touchdown

5:15 AM CDT (10:15 UTC)

Lifted

5:16 AM CDT (10:16 UTC)

On the ground

1 minutes

Path length

1.1 miles (1.8 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

2

Property damage

$225,000

County

Saline County

Touchdown point

37.791, -88.403

Lift-off point

37.789, -88.382

Record number

2404020415-01

40 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PAH, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 115 mph.

• Two wooden power poles leaning.
• Damage is in tree line about 200 yards east.
• Cattle feed barn knocked down

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

Early morning, the surface low was located just north of St. Louis, Missouri, lifting to the NNE as it rapidly deepened. For Southern Illinois, early morning effective bulk shear was 60-65 kts, with a very high 20-30 kts of 0-1 km shear, while SRHs near the Ohio River were around 150-200 m2/s2. MLCAPE was 1000 J/kg, and mid-level lapse rates were 6.5 C/km. A 70-90 kt mid-level jet was west of the Quad State. A strong capping inversion suppressed storm activity in the evening, but the strong lift and upper level diffluence won out early morning. Two lines of storms developed after midnight in Southeast Missouri. The first progressed through the I-64 corridor from 0100-0400 CST. The latter was a very potent thunderstorm line racing eastward early morning April 2nd. This line continued throughout the day all the way to West Virginia, being designated a derecho. For Southern Illinois, widespread wind damage occurred with this line, and sections of the line that took a north-south orientation had a much more favorable line-normal component of shear promoting QLCS tornado development. Seven tornadoes originated in Southern Illinois: 2 in Williamson County (EF-2 and EF-1), 1 in Saline County (EF-2), 3 in Gallatin County (all EF-1s), and 1 in White County (EF-2 with the EF-2 damage in Posey County Indiana). Two people suffered laceration injuries due to flying debris with the Saline County tornado. A total of 19 tornadoes were found during this event, the highest single day total for the NWS Paducah forecast area since Halloween 2003 (also 19).

An EF-2 tornado occurred approximately two miles southeast of Eldorado during the early morning hours of Tuesday, April 2nd. The tornado began near the intersection of Highway 142 and Ridgway Road. Here, the tornado destroyed an outbuilding, uprooted several large trees, and removed portions of the roofs of two homes. Crossing Ridgway Road and the intersection of White Road, the tornado severely damaged an industrial garage and two manufactured homes. One manufactured home was moved several feet off its foundation and had one of its walls torn open. Two occupants of the home suffered laceration injuries due to flying debris. About five large hardwood trees just behind this home were all snapped at the base. Moving east-southeast, the tornado lifted near Dusty Road just south of Ridgway Road. Peak winds were estimated at 115 mph.

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

26 minutes of warning. NWS PAH issued a tornado warning for this county at 09:49 UTC, 26 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 10:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 07:12 UTC and running to 11:21 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 06:00 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 Evansville,IN radar (KVWX), 78 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 10:13 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 2024 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

68 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 69 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.