EF1 tornado, Emerson, Ohio, October 21, 2021

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

October 21, 2021

Touchdown

7:03 PM EDT (23:03 UTC)

Lifted

7:05 PM EDT (23:05 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.4 miles (0.7 km)

Path width

70 yards (64 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$150,000

County

Jefferson County

Touchdown point

40.165, -80.829

Lift-off point

40.166, -80.821

Record number

2110211703-01

13 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PBZ, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

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

A broken line of supercells, which formed along a front quickly moved through the Ohio River Valley the evening of October 21st and spun off several tornadoes. The number of tornadoes, the time of year, and the intensity (one long track EF2 tornado) will mark this event as very rare and significant for this region. ||Prior to tornado development, surface temperatures warmed into the low-mid 60s, while dew points topped out near 60F. Forecast soundings indicate 100-250 J/kg MLCAPE and a relatively straight hodograph yielding 150-225 m2/s2 0-1 km storm relative helicity. The overall quick track of the broken line and eastward propagation helped cells sustain a rotating updrafts.

The National Weather Service conducted a survey off Township Road|102 just southwest of Mt. Pleasant, Ohio. The damage was confined|to hardwood and softwood trees. They were either snapped at the |trunk, missing large branches, or uprooted. There was a 100 year |old oak tree that was uprooted. The only structure damage was to a|house, which loss less than 20% of its shingles. |Estimated Maximum Wind Speed...100 mph.|Estimated damage cost was provided by the local emergency manager.

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

6 minutes of warning. NWS PBZ issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:57 UTC, 6 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:30 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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:40 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.

Wheeling/Ohio Co. (HLG), 15 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Pittsburgh radar (KPBZ), 66 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:04 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 2021 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

18 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.