EF0 tornado, Cadiz Broadbent Arpt to Sinking Fork, Kentucky, March 27, 2017

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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 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

EF0

Date

March 27, 2017

Touchdown

2:27 PM CDT (19:27 UTC)

Lifted

2:33 PM CDT (19:33 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

4.4 miles (7.1 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$75,000

Counties

Trigg and Christian counties

Touchdown point

36.933, -87.732

Lift-off point

36.949, -87.654

Record number

1703271327-01

8 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PAH, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 81 mph.

• Damage blown in north and east directions. Width approx. 125 yards. 2 Barns damaged. One blown several inches northward off its foundation and a second had its north wall blown northward with debris blown to the ENE. Amish occupants werte inside and heard a "whistleling freight train" sound.
• 2 eyewitnesses of the tornado.
• Back porch roof blown off and up against a tree line. Several trees broken.
• Small, older barn blown down.

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

Severe thunderstorms developed during the afternoon within an increasingly moist and unstable air mass across the region. Isolated severe thunderstorm cells organized into a large bowing line of storms that spread east-northeastward across the Pennyrile region of western Kentucky. Numerous reports of large hail were received as the initial cells developed west of Kentucky Lake. Once the bowing line developed, there were pockets of damaging winds and an isolated tornado in the Pennyrile region, extending from Madisonville to the Hopkinsville/Cadiz area. The storms occurred ahead of a cold front as it progressed southeast across southern Illinois and southeast Missouri. The cold front trailed from a low pressure center that moved east-northeast from the St. Louis area.

Peak winds were estimated near 80 mph. The tornado was witnessed by two people. Four barns were damaged, and one small barn was leveled. A house porch roof was blown off. Branches were broken off numerous trees. The damage path began along Highway 128 southwest of Cerulean, then crossed Highway 126 about 1.5 miles south of Cerulean. The tornado continued into Christian County for just a few more tenths of a mile.

The tornado path continued from Trigg County into Christian County. The tornado was only on the ground for about three-tenths of a mile in Christian County before lifting. Two barns were damaged. One barn was blown several inches northward off its foundation. A second barn had its north wall blown northward, with debris blown to the east-northeast. The damage was only about a mile south of Highway 624 near the Trigg County line. Peak winds were estimated near 80 mph.

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.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 17:08 UTC and running to 22:15 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:30 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 Ft Campbell radar (KHPX), 43 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 19:24 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 2017 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are

5 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.