F2 tornado, London, Kentucky, June 2, 2001

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

June 2, 2001

Touchdown

6:02 PM EDT (22:02 UTC)

Path length

7.0 miles (11.3 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

10

Property damage

$17 million

County

Laurel County

Touchdown point

37.130, -84.080

Lift-off point

37.130, -84.080

Record number

238

A strong F2 tornado with wind estimates between 135 and 155 miles per hour ripped through downtown London during the evening hours. The Carnaby Square shopping center was hard hit. The tornado was reported by eye witnesses to have been nearly stationary in the parking lot for nearly 4 minutes. During this time several automobiles including a large moving van were overtured. A 20 by 30 foot chunk of 4 inch thick blacktop from the parking lot was torn up and thrown approximately 100 feet. Merchandise from one of the stores was later found 25 miles to the east. The tornado lifted before crossing U.S. Highway 25. The tornado touched down again along Bellinger Street between 6:15 and 6:20 pm where several homes received major damage. One duplex lost its entire roof as a mother and her two sons took shelter on the second floor. A mobile home used for storage was demolished. One block over on Morgan Street several brick and framed homes lost their entire roofs. A framed home placed on a block foundation was blown 15 feet away from the foundation. The storm lifted as if approached the Rolling Acres Subdivision. Witnesses reported seeing two funnel clouds at this time as the storm continued moving east. Damage was confined to large trees and some shingle damage on roofs of homes. The storm again dropped a tornado as it approached a ball park just northwest of the intersection of Kentucky Highway 192 and 80. Three of the four teams in the park took refuge in the concession stand and the fourth team remained in the dugout where parents covered the children while laying on the ground. One mid sized truck was tossed from the parking lot approximately 150 feet. Fencing from both ball diamonds was blown away. The last major damage occurred at a mobile home sales lot near the intersection of Kentucky Highway 192 and the Daniel Boone Parkway. Eight mobile homes weighing 8 to 12 tons were totaled.Emergency management officials reported that there were 10 minor injuries with the most serious being a broken arm. Eighteen residences were destroyed, 21 received major damage while 84 received minor damage. Twenty-six businesses suffered major damage. One church received major damage with another receiving minor damage. Thirty vehicles were destroyed and three 18 wheel tractor trailers were overturned.

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.

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 20:32 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.

London-Corbin Airport (LOZ), 5 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Jackson,KY radar (KJKL), 85 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:02 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 2001 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are

3 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.