EF0 tornado, New Orleans to Algiers, Louisiana, May 12, 2021

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

May 12, 2021

Touchdown

2:05 AM CDT (07:05 UTC)

Lifted

2:12 AM CDT (07:12 UTC)

On the ground

7 minutes

Path length

5.3 miles (8.6 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$125,000

County

Orleans Parish

Touchdown point

29.949, -90.119

Lift-off point

29.950, -90.032

Record number

2105120105-01

18 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LIX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 85 mph.

• Large branches down in green park
• Rotted large branches down. Lots of twig and leaf debris scattered throughout
• Shingles torn off roof of school building. Barricades blown over
• Light pole down facing N but lots of twig and branch debris facing E

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

Early in the morning hours on May 12th, 2021, a stalled frontal boundary and associated mid-level disturbance helped to develop an eastward surging squall line across portions of southeastern Louisiana, resulting in damaging straight line winds and an isolated tornado.

A tornado touched down between Claiborne Ave and Carrollton Ave in the Uptown area of New Orleans. It tracked east producing mostly tree and limb damage with a large tree uprooted near Napoleon Ave. It continued to track east producing tree damage before arriving near the Amtrak terminal and peeling back the tin roof on a large metal building. It tracked southeast, knocking down branches and trees in the Central Business District and then crossed the Mississippi River into Algiers. The tornado knocked down trees and power poles along with minor roof damage to a few homes and businesses before lifting near the Naval Support Activity Center.

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 05:32 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.

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 2021 tornado in LouisianaEvery tornado in Louisiana since 1950Warnings in force in Louisiana nowThe forecast where you are

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.