EF1 tornado, McKean County, Pennsylvania, September 9, 2026

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, as surveyed

EF1, preliminary

Date

September 9, 2026

Touchdown

7:19 PM EDT (23:19 UTC)

Lifted

7:22 PM EDT (23:22 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

1.2 miles (2.0 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

McKean County

Touchdown point

41.810, -78.627

Lift-off point

41.814, -78.605

Highest wind the damage implies

105 mph

Surveyed by

NWS CTP

The office's name for it

Lafayette Township Tornado

Survey last edited

September 12, 2026

Record number

None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

At 7:19 p.m. local time September 9, 2026 an EF-1 tornado with maximum wind speeds of 105mph touched down between Bradford Airport and Bingham Road with a maximum width of about 200 yards. It traveled east/northeast and damaged some trees around and west of Bingham Road. The tornado continued through the area of woods east of Bingham Road before doing its most intense damage along and north of Sprester Road. It uprooted and snapped many trees before flipping a trailer on its side. The tornado turned northeast and continued damaging trees into the woods before dissipating as it approached the Buffalo & Pittsburgh Railroad line around 7:22 p.m. local time.

We would like to thank McKean County Emergency Management and members of the community who provided firsthand accounts, footage, and pictures of damage.

Written by NWS CTP in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

17 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS CTP, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 105 mph.

• Nine or so uprooted in the area
• Lot of directions at play with other trees, chaotic
• A few snapped to the north but some others more to the east around

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

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.

Bradford Regional (BFD), 2 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The State College radar (KCCX), 111 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:20 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2026 tornado in PennsylvaniaEvery tornado in Pennsylvania since 1950Warnings in force in Pennsylvania nowThe forecast where you are

1 more have been surveyed in the United States that day, so far.

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.