EF0 tornado, Loretto to Busby, Tennessee, May 1, 2010

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

May 1, 2010

Touchdown

4:23 PM CDT (21:23 UTC)

Lifted

4:26 PM CDT (21:26 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

3.1 miles (5.0 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$10,000

Crop damage

$1,000

County

Lawrence County

Touchdown point

35.096, -87.433

Lift-off point

35.108, -87.380

Record number

1005011523-01

A frontal boundary setup across Western and Middle Tennessee late Friday night (April 30), and remained through the weekend. A persistent southerly flow fed moisture into the area and precipitable water values rose to almost 2 inches, based on data from KOHX upper air soundings. As a series of shortwaves moved through, a band of showers and thunderstorms developed and remained nearly stationary for much of the day on Saturday, May 1st and Sunday, May 2nd, resulting in widespread record flooding across much of Middle Tennessee. Some of these thunderstorms became severe also, resulting in thunderstorm wind damage and seven confirmed tornadoes across Middle Tennessee.

EF-0 tornado with maximum winds around 80 mph touched down near Loretto. The most significant damage extended from Brenda Avenue east-northeast to a residence off of Glendale Road. A couple dozen trees were uprooted and a few softwood trees were snapped. One home suffered some minor roof damage.

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

7 minutes of warning. NWS OHX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:16 UTC, 7 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 14:55 UTC and running to 23:00 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 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 20:11 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), 122 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:20 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.

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 2010 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

11 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.