F2 tornado, Cane Vly to Breeding, Kentucky, March 28, 1997

1. F040 to 72 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. F173 to 112 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. F4207 to 260 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. F5261 to 318 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

F2

Date

March 28, 1997

Touchdown

7:45 PM CST (01:45 UTC)

Path length

1.0 miles (1.6 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Adair County

Touchdown point

36.970, -85.430

Lift-off point

36.970, -85.420

Record number

652

A strong F3 tornado touched down in the Cane Valley area destroying 15 mobile homes, 14 homes, a business, a church and 12 barns. Also, 26 homes, 2 businesses and 2 churches were heavily damaged. 51 homes were destroyed and 50 damaged across northern Adair county. The tornado moved northeast skipping at times to Pellyton before lifting. Only 7 minor injuries were reported, however. Many people sought refugee in one of the damaged churches.

An F2 tornado touched down 1 mile west of Summer Shade just inside the Metcalfe-Barren county boarder at the intersection of Highway 90 and the Milam-Clark road killing a 28 year old woman and injuring her husband and two children. The family was thrown from their mobile home which was completely destroyed and blown away. From there, the tornado crossed Highway 90 and Highway 640 with houses damaged and some mobile homes destroyed. Then it crossed Highway 163 just south of Goodluck where one house was completely lifted off its foundation and then set back down again. The tornado proceeded into southwestern Adair county and lifted just north of Breeding. Over 100 barns, 11 mobile homes and 8 houses saw extensive structural damage or were completely destroyed across Metcalfe county with an additional 20 houses with at least moderate damage. Many other residences, barns and outbuildings received minor damage. No major damage or injuries were reported in Adair county.

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

34 minutes of warning. NWS LMK issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:11 UTC, 34 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 02:00 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. The outlook in force was issued at 05:53 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 Louisville radar (KLVX), 121 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:44 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 1997 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are

23 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.