F3 tornado, Dyer to Rutherford, Tennessee, April 2, 2006

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 mph

   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 mphthis tornado

   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

F3

Date

April 2, 2006

Touchdown

8:43 PM CDT (01:43 UTC)

Path length

8.0 miles (12.9 km)

Path width

880 yards (805 m)

Deaths

2

Injuries

6

Property damage

$15 million

County

Gibson County

Touchdown point

36.180, -89.050

Lift-off point

36.130, -88.970

Record number

271

This tornado was also spawned by the same supercell that produced the killer Dyer County tornado. The F3 tornado tracked east across Gibson County. The tornado then continued east into Weakley County. The hardest hit area was the city of Bradford. There were six fatalities in Bradford along with forty-four injuries. Approximately two hundred fifty homes were damaged and seventy-five homes were destroyed. The Bradford Police Department was completely destroyed. Other businesses were also severely damaged.

This tornado was the second of two F3 tornadoes that affected Gibson County on April 2nd. The tornado touched down just south of the Obion and Gibson County line and tracked southeast. The tornado lifted just east of Rutherford near the intersection of China Grove Rd and Highway 105. Two fatalities occurred as a result of this tornado along with six injuries. Approximately two hundred fifty homes were damaged and six were destroyed. Cars were tossed into open fields.

The deaths

8 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.

48 minutes of warning. NWS MEG issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:55 UTC, 48 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 21:40 UTC and running to 03:33 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 01:19 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 Paducah radar (KPAH), 104 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:40 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 2006 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

66 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 67 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.