EF2 tornado, Ottoville to Dupont, Ohio, April 2, 2025

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

April 2, 2025

Touchdown

11:18 PM EDT (03:18 UTC)

Lifted

11:22 PM EDT (03:22 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

4.7 miles (7.5 km)

Path width

375 yards (343 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

2

Property damage

$500,000

Counties

Putnam and Paulding counties

Touchdown point

41.026, -84.348

Lift-off point

41.070, -84.280

Record number

2504022118-01

46 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS IWX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 120 mph.

• Barn built in 2012. Complete removal of metal roof. Nearly all trusses simply fell into the structure. Some boards noted upstream. Wind speed lowered as a result.
• Anchored mobile home( 7 anchors) r olled about 60ft to the NNW. Debris scattered up to 1/2 mile to the north and north northwest. 3 occupants, one with scrapes and bruises and the other one with a torn bicep. Tornado must have touched down right near the mobile home as trees to the NW were untouched.
• Well anchored (concrete with rebar) 60x100ft barn destroyed.
• Tree might have weakened structure

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

The atmosphere was primed for severe weather during the afternoon and evening hours of April 2nd. 0-1 km SRH values of 300 to 500 m2/s2, 60 to 70 kts of shear and MLCAPE of around 1000 J/KG set the stage for numerous thunderstorms. Damage reports were not as widespread, but those that occurred tended to be in swaths related to cold pools from bowing segments or tornadoes. Eight tornadoes (three in northern Indiana, one which crossed from Indiana into Lower Michigan, one in lower Michigan and three in northwestern Ohio). A total of five injuries were reported (three in NW Ohio and two in N Indiana).

A tornado touched down on the south side of Van Wert, OH where a barn was destroyed on US 127 south of Peter Collins Rd. The tornado continued to the northeast through open fields. Tree and shingle damage was then noted on Middle Point Rd near the intersection with SR 116 where the tornado completely destroyed a two-story barn structure. The tornado might have briefly skipped as it traversed to the northeast before causing noticeable damage on Lincoln Hwy. The tornado then caused some minor damage to a deer farm before destroying a pole barn. After crossing into Putnam county north of the intersection of US 224 and Bockey Rd. the last noticeable damage occurred just northwest of Ottoville. As this tornado dissipated, another tornado formed off just to its north. The total track across the two counties was 15.6 miles with maximum winds of 95 mph.

A second tornado spun up north of the decaying Van Wert tornado, touching down in far southeast Paulding County. The tornado severely damaged a pole barn as it moved into Putnam county. The tornado rapidly moved northeast, hitting a well anchored mobile homed and flipping it 60 feet away. Three occupants were in the mobile home and two of them sustained minor injuries. It is here that the tornado peaked at an EF-2 with an estimated wind speed of 120 mph. The tornado destroyed another well-anchored 60x120 ft pole barn, throwing its debris onto the bank of the Auglaize River. To the northeast, it directly hit the town of Dupont where it did widespread EF-0 to EF-1 damage throughout. The tornado damaged several large corn silos (one that was full of corn had the ground anchor bolts break from uplift). It is near here where the visible damage stopped.

A second tornado spun up north of the decaying Van Wert tornado, touching down in far southeast Paulding County. The tornado severely damaged a pole barn as it moved into Putnam county. The tornado rapidly moved northeast, hitting a well anchored mobile homed and flipping it 60 feet away. Three occupants were in the mobile home and two of them sustained minor injuries. It is here that the tornado peaked at an EF-2 with an estimated wind speed of 120 mph. The tornado destroyed another well-anchored 60x120 ft pole barn, throwing its debris onto the bank of the Auglaize River. To the northeast, it directly hit the town of Dupont where it did widespread EF-0 to EF-1 damage throughout. The tornado damaged several large corn silos (one that was full of corn had the ground anchor bolts break from uplift). It is near here where the visible damage stopped.

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

2 minutes of warning. NWS IWX issued a tornado warning for this county at 03:16 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 03:26 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 01:15 UTC and running to 04:21 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 00:55 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 Northern Indiana radar (KIWX), 121 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:17 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 2025 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

87 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 88 of them

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.