EF1 tornado, Columbus/Lowndes Co to Melrose, Mississippi, March 31, 2016

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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF1

Date

March 31, 2016

Touchdown

6:18 PM CDT (23:18 UTC)

Lifted

6:37 PM CDT (23:37 UTC)

On the ground

19 minutes

Path length

7.8 miles (12.5 km)

Path width

600 yards (549 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$225,000

Counties

Lowndes and Pickens counties

Touchdown point

33.420, -88.370

Lift-off point

33.484, -88.263

Record number

1603311718-01

68 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS BMX and NWS JAN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

• Skirting and visible damage
• several trees uprooted with convergence. tree on home
• Several trees uprooted, some pointed north and some pointed northeast
• multi-trees uprooted and snapped

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

Widespread severe weather and some flash flooding occurred over the ArkLaMiss region from the evening of March 30th through the evening of March 31st. On March 30th an upper level storm system moved into the region from the Southern Plains. It was accompanied by a slow moving cold front extending from a large surface low across the Central Plains into the middle Mississippi Valley.||A warm moisture rich air mass from the Gulf of Mexico moved into the region as a warm front lifted northward on the 30th. A series of potent upper level disturbances crossed the region through the 31st, bringing a rapid increase in wind aloft and resulting in an unstable environment that contained high levels of wind shear. These factors set the stage for flash flooding and several rounds of severe weather. Widespread severe weather occurred with a mix of damaging winds, up to golf ball sized hail, and two EF-1 tornadoes that occurred in Lamar and Lowndes counties. Parts of the Delta region experienced flash flooding, especially in Washington, Sunflower, Leflore, Carroll, and Montgomery counties. Fifteen homes had to be evacuated at Moorhead in Sunflower County. There were flooding issues on many primary and secondary roads. There was also additional river flooding from this system.||The cold front moved across the region on night of the 31st, thus ending the severe weather from the northwest.

A very warm and unstable air mass developed over west Alabama by the late afternoon on March 31st. Surface air temperatures warmed into the upper 70s with surface dewpoints in the upper 60s. Thunderstorms developed rapidly over Mississippi and spread into central Alabama during the evening hours. 0-6 km Bulk Shear values increased to between 50 and 60 knots and the storms quickly became severe, including tornadoes.

The tornado began southeast of Columbus on Frisco Road. Here, there were a few trees snapped and limb debris. The tornado continued northeast crossing Hughes Road and Hildreth Road, snapping and downing trees along the path. As it crossed Hughes Road, it peeled back the roof of a shed. The tornado began to get wider as it moved across Hildreth Road. The tornado continued through a wooded area north of Hildreth Road until crossing Bryant Road. Here a fence was blown down and higher damage occurred at the dead end. Many trees were blown down along the end of the road and shingle damaged occurred to a few homes. Large trees were downed off to the north of the road in the wooded area. It began to show signs of becoming a multiple vortex tornado, as there seemed to be two distinct corridors of damage. The tornado continued northeast before crossing Highway 69 where many trees were snapped, bringing down a powerline and snapping a powerpole. The tornado continued northeast before crossing New Hope Road and Petersburg Road. Along in this area the tornado was very wide, over a quarter mile, and caused numerous trees to be downed. A few trees were on homes, especially along Petersburg Road, where numerous homes had shingle damage, a tree fell on a home and minor damage occurred to a shed. The tornado continued northeast before crossing Pritchard Lane, continuing to show signs of a multi-vortex tornado. Numerous trees were downed along the road and minor roof damage occurred to a shed. The tornado then crossed Lake Lowndes Road where many trees were snapped and a few powerlines were blown down. It was in this area and crossing into the Lakeover subdivision on Lakeover Drive where the highest damage occurred with high end EF1 damage with winds reaching around 110 mph. Numerous trees were blown down, with some falling into homes, and numerous had shingle damage. The tornado continued northeast, crossing Lake Lowndes Road and Ernest Drive. Many large trees were blown down and roof was peeled back on a shed on Ernest Drive. The tornado crossed Old Yorkville Road, continuing to take down numerous trees along the path and taking down a powerpole. The tornado then crossed into an open field before moving into a wooded area. The tornado continued before crossing State Line Road at the Mississippi-Alabama border, where a powerpole was snapped and numerous trees were uprooted. The tornado began to turn more to the north-northeast after crossing the state line into Alabama and crossed Robin Road, where multiple trees were downed, blocking the railroad tracks. It continued north-northeast and crossed Eagle Road, where numerous trees were uprooted and snapped. The tornado continued across County Road 30 and Pine Wood Circle, snapping and uprooting many trees. The tornado dissipated just after crossing Highway 82. It was rated an EF-1 with estimated maximum winds of 110 mph. The damage path length was 5.8 miles (7.9 miles total). The maximum path width was 600 yards.

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in northwest Pickens County near Stafford and determined that the damage was consistent with an EF-1 tornado. Maximum winds were estimated to be around 100 mph. ||The tornado started in Mississippi and crossed the state line into Pickens County about 2.3 miles south of Highway 82. The tornado tracked northeast and crossed Eagle Road and County Road 30 before dissipating just north of Highway 82. The damage along the path consisted mainly of snapped and uprooted trees. There was some minor damage to a mobile home as the tornado approached County Road 30.

National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in northwest Pickens County just north of Ethelsville and determined that the damage was consistent with an EF-1 tornado. Maximum winds were estimated to be around 95 mph. ||The tornado touched down near County Road 75 just south of Highway 34. Numerous trees were snapped and uprooted along County Road 75, and there was some minor roof and siding damage to a single residence. The tornado tracked east-northeast in an area that was not accessible by vehicle. The next damage area was along Mineral-Springs Church Road just south of Highway 34, where numerous trees were uprooted and snapped. The tornado continued eastward along Highway 34 and produced loss of shingles to a home and destroyed several outbuildings. The tornado crossed Shockley Road and produced considerable damage to a metal roof of a wood framed home and damage to several outbuildings. The tornado lifted just east of this damage.

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

1 minute of warning. NWS JAN issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:17 UTC, 1 minute before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 19:35 UTC and running to 01:26 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 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 20:00 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.

Columbus Afb (CBM), 24 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Columbus AFB radar (KGWX), 49 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:19 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 2016 tornado in MississippiEvery tornado in Mississippi since 1950Warnings in force in Mississippi nowThe forecast where you are

19 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.