EF1 tornado, Petal, Mississippi, August 30, 2017

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

August 30, 2017

Touchdown

11:41 AM CDT (16:41 UTC)

Lifted

11:45 AM CDT (16:45 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

1.3 miles (2.0 km)

Path width

160 yards (146 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$200,000

County

Forrest County

Touchdown point

31.346, -89.269

Lift-off point

31.364, -89.271

Record number

1708301041-01

12 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS JAN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 90 mph.

• few trees uprooted, part off roof off building, fence down
• trees uprooted, snapped, roof dmg to building.
• few trees uprooted, one tree on 2 vehicles, lines down.

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

The remnants of Hurricane Harvey moved across the ArkLaMiss region on August 30th and 31st and brought gusty winds and rain to the region. A few tornadoes also occurred on the 30th. As Harvey decreased to a depression on the 31st, gusty winds still remained across portions of the region. This resulted in some downed trees outside of any shower activity.

This tornado touched down in Petal along West Central Ave. Here, two businesses sustained minor roof damage with a portion of the roof peeled off. Several trees were uprooted and a fence was blown down. As the tornado moved northward, a few more trees were downed along with limbs broken off trees. Along Stevens St, a large tree crushed two vehicles. More minor tree damage occurred across several streets before the tornado crossed the intersection of Highway 11 and the Evelyn Gandy Parkway, where more trees were damaged. The tornado lifted after it crossed into the wooded area north of the Parkway near the Leaf River. Maximum winds were around 90 mph.

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

58 minutes of warning. NWS JAN issued a tornado warning for this county at 15:43 UTC, 58 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 16:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 15:23 UTC and running to 23:00 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:27 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 Jackson/Brandon,MS radar (KDGX), 123 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:40 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 MississippiEvery tornado in Mississippi since 1950Warnings in force in Mississippi nowThe forecast where you are

6 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.