EF2 tornado, Irondale to Herron Arpt, Ohio, May 7, 2024

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 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 mphthis tornado

   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

EF2

Date

May 7, 2024

Touchdown

11:54 PM CDT (04:54 UTC)

Lifted

12:17 AM CDT (05:17 UTC)

On the ground

23 minutes

Path length

15.3 miles (24.6 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

1

Property damage

$10,000

Counties

Hancock, Jefferson and Beaver counties

Touchdown point

40.583, -80.801

Lift-off point

40.560, -80.512

Record number

2405072254-01

19 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PBZ, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 130 mph.

• All trees down along road Edge. Shallow roots where drainage collects?
• Roof completely removed from well built two story residence. Detached garage destroyed but no sign of anchoring of walls to wood plate above foundation
• Most trees uprooted. Several very mature trees left standing and debarked.
• 90 year female injured by shattered glass from tornado and taken to hospital with numerous abbrasions

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

Potent low pressure tracked across the Upper Midwest from May 7th into May 8th, pushing an occluded boundary across the Upper Ohio Valley. Strong warm and moist advection kept conditions favorable for convection into the overnight hours, with high levels of shear and a surface trough also supporting storm development. Cyclic supercell structures supported higher-end straight line wind damage, as well as three tornadoes in eastern Ohio. One of these ended up being one of the stronger and more significant tornadoes in the region's recent history, a high-end EF2 that ultimately tracked across 15 miles and three states.

Potent low pressure tracked across the Upper Midwest from May 7th into May 8th, pushing an occluded boundary across the Upper Ohio Valley. Strong warm and moist advection kept conditions favorable for convection into the overnight hours, with high levels of shear and a surface trough also supporting storm development. Cyclic supercell structures supported a few instances of straight line wind damage in the surrounding region. The only report of severe weather in the northern West Virginia panhandle ended up being part of the track of one of the stronger and more significant tornadoes in the recent history of the region, a high-end EF2 that ultimately tracked across 15 miles and three states.

A supercell thunderstorm, embedded within a broken line of thunderstorms, produced a series of tornadoes as it tracked across eastern Ohio, the northern West Virginia panhandle, and western Pennsylvania during the early morning hours on May 8th.||The most significant tornado developed across northwest Jefferson County, Ohio around 12:54 AM, along County Highway 55. Initially, it snapped and uprooted numerous hardwood trees. As the tornado moved east along Highway 55, it took roofs off multiple homes, overturned and tossed a mobile home, and shifted a single family residence off its foundation. The twister then moved into the center of Irondale, where numerous hardwood and softwood trees were uprooted and snapped, all consistent with EF-2 damage. The tornado was able to descend and climb through steep terrain, with hundreds of trees observed damaged or destroyed from the Highway 55 ridge line and along a steep several hundred foot escarpment. Several trees fell onto homes causing damage. A metal building system lost its roof and part of the side walls. The tornado continued to move east causing downed trees along State Route 213 in Hammondsville, eastward to the Ohio river.

A supercell thunderstorm, embedded within a broken line of thunderstorms, produced a series of tornadoes as it tracked across eastern Ohio, the northern West Virginia panhandle, and western Pennsylvania during the early morning hours on May 8th.||After crossing the Ohio River south of Wellsville, the tornado reached peak intensity as it crossed the community of Fairhaven several|miles south of Chester, West Virginia. Extensive tree and structural damage was observed along International Drive and Locust Hill Road. There were multiple homes that lost their entire roof and sustained damage to side walls. Numerous barns and outbuildings were completely destroyed. All mature hardwood and softwood trees, some well over 100 years old, were snapped with a few lingering hardwood trees that were debarked. A high-end EF2 rating of 130 mph was observed in this location. Pittsburgh Doppler radar velocity signatures in this area were at the high end of those observed historically, coupled with a significant debris signature aloft. Further damage was observed across Route 8 extending back uphill into the next ridge line, where an auto repair metal outbuilding was destroyed, along with damage sustained to several vintage automobiles. The adjacent property suffered loss of roofing, a porch, and an addition. The tornado then crossed into Pennsylvania.

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.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 01:17 UTC and running to 05:57 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 01:11 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 Pittsburgh radar (KPBZ), 37 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:53 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 2024 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

52 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.