EF0 tornado, Adamsville, Pennsylvania, August 18, 2021

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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 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

EF0

Date

August 18, 2021

Touchdown

8:35 PM EDT (00:35 UTC)

Lifted

8:37 PM EDT (00:37 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.7 miles (1.1 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$20,000

County

York County

Touchdown point

39.856, -76.627

Lift-off point

39.863, -76.618

Record number

2108181835-01

4 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS CTP, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 88 mph.

• Trees downed and snapped, some falling toward the NW and some toward the NE and E. Estimated wind 85 mph.
• Playhouse moved off posts in the ground and carried NW.
• Wooden swing set lofted and spun around. Metal fence collapsed.

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

An EF-0 tornado touched down near Winterstown during the evening of August 18, 2021. The tornado had estimated peak winds near 85 mph, a path length of around 0.7 miles, and a maximum path width of 125 yards.

An EF-0 tornado touched down near Winterstown during the evening of August 18, 2021. The tornado had estimated peak winds near 85 mph, a path length of around 0.7 miles, and a maximum path width of 125 yards. The tornado touched down south of List Road and tracked northeastward across Main Street before lifting just south of Pleasant View Road in North Hopewell Township/Winterstown Borough. Damage consisted of one to two dozen snapped/uprooted trees (mostly softwood pines) with some tops sheared off. Some of the tree tops were lofted 25 to 45 yards. Two homes along the path received minor damage to siding, and a wooden swing set was damaged.

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 15:37 UTC and running to 03:00 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:38 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.

Thomasville/York (THV), 22 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Sterling radar (KLWX), 123 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:35 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 PennsylvaniaEvery tornado in Pennsylvania since 1950Warnings in force in Pennsylvania 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.