EF0 tornado, Donelson to Foster Corners, Tennessee, June 21, 2019

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

June 21, 2019

Touchdown

8:04 PM CDT (01:04 UTC)

Lifted

8:06 PM CDT (01:06 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

1.3 miles (2.0 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$30,000

Counties

Davidson, Macon and Allen counties

Touchdown point

36.078, -86.608

Lift-off point

36.072, -86.589

Record number

1906211904-01

128 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS OHX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 85 mph.

• Couldn't tell if this was a board sticking into the roof or part of the roof peeled off
• Debris from homes along south side of road here

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

The most widespread damaging wind event to affect Middle Tennessee in at least 15 years struck the area during the evening hours on Friday, June 21, 2019. A long line of severe thunderstorms known as a MCS (mesoscale convective system) formed across southeast Missouri during the day, then moved southeast across Middle Tennessee between 6-10pm. With ample instability and unusually strong wind shear for late June in place, these storms produced widespread damaging winds in every Middle Tennessee county. Thousands of trees were blown down across the region, including some that had been standing since the Civil War. Damage to power lines and poles resulted in an estimated 100,000+ power outages, with some people without electricity for up to 1 week. In addition to the damaging winds, large hail up to quarter size was reported, and several mesocyclones within the line of storms spawned 4 tornadoes and several funnel clouds. Due to the long path and severity of the wind damage with this MCS, the Storm Prediction Center classified this event as a derecho.

A brief EF0 tornado touched down In the Stones River Bend Park and moved southeast, snapping several trees along the river. Moving through the Standford Estates subdivsion, the tornado blew down numerous large trees in a convergent pattern on Edgemont Drive, Myrick Drive, Stanford Drive, Belding Drive, and Jenry Drive, with some trees falling onto and severely damaging homes. Many of these same homes were also damaged in a severe microburst on April 18, 2017. The tornado continued southeast and blew down many more trees on Wellington Square, Lebanon Pike, and along the Stones River Greenway before lifting.

A small, brief EF0 tornado touched down in Antioch near the intersection of Anderson Road and Country Way Road. The tornado took a U-shaped path and moved southeast across Oak Trees Court, Country Meadow Drive, Country Meadow Court, Country Lawn Drive, Towne Village Road, Fall Court, Dove Creek Road, and Huntingboro Trail, snapping and uprooting numerous trees in a narrow, convergent path. A few trees fell onto homes causing minor damage. Turning more eastward, the tornado strengthened and caused significant roof and siding damage to many homes along Leatherbury Court, Seasons Lake Court, and Seasons Drive. The tornado appears to have lifted north of the intersection of Smith Springs Parkway and Mt View Road.

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 severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 22:47 UTC and running to 01:53 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 00:44 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.

Nashville Metro (BNA), 9 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Nashville radar (KOHX), 19 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:03 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 2019 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

12 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.