F1 tornado, Wartrace, Tennessee, April 20, 2000

1. F040 to 72 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

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

3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. F4207 to 260 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. F5261 to 318 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

F1

Date

April 20, 2000

Touchdown

7:14 PM CDT (00:14 UTC)

Path length

2.0 miles (3.2 km)

Path width

60 yards (55 m)

Deaths

1

Injuries

0

Property damage

$30,000

County

Bedford County

Touchdown point

35.530, -86.400

Lift-off point

35.530, -86.370

Record number

101

The tornado first touched down about 2.5 mles west of Wartrace at the intersection of Railroad Avenue and Horse Mountain Road...having an intensity of F1 and a width of about 200 feet. The total path length is about 2 miles.The greatest amount of damage and the fatality occurred near the beginning of its track where the tornado had its greatest intensity. The damage included some large trees that were uprooted and snapped...roof damage to one house...moving both a house and mobile home on their foundations..and overturning a nearby mobile home.Regarding the fatality...local law enforcement mentioned that as the storm approached...a man got back in a small pickup truck to escape the impending rain and hail. The tornado then struck and moved or rolled the truck across a field and through a barn...causing or aiding the barn being destroyed. The truck ended up in a creekbed over 350 feet away. The man was throw from the truck and was found underneath the vehicle in the creekbed. Only sporadic damage occurred after the tornado weakened...with roof damage to several barns and out buildings...some twisting...snapping...and uprooting of some trees...and a few power poles snapped.

The deaths

1 direct deaths are recorded for this tornado, each with what Storm Data knows of it.

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

33 minutes of warning. NWS OHX issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:41 UTC, 33 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:30 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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:47 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 Northeast Alabama radar (KHTX), 72 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:13 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 2000 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

13 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.