EF1 tornado, Uptonville to Deanburg, Tennessee, May 26, 2024

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

EF1

Date

May 26, 2024

Touchdown

12:55 AM CDT (05:55 UTC)

Lifted

1:07 AM CDT (06:07 UTC)

On the ground

12 minutes

Path length

10.9 miles (17.6 km)

Path width

550 yards (503 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$160,000

Counties

Madison, Hardeman and Chester counties

Touchdown point

35.440, -88.997

Lift-off point

35.420, -88.805

Record number

2405262355-01

47 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS MEG, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 107 mph.

• Car port beams are shifted but standing
• Move point 50 yards to the north
• Damage 100 yards to the SW

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

A shortwave trough pushed into the Mid-South during the early morning hours. A very moist and unstable air mass provided plenty of fuel for the trough to initiate convection. The atmosphere harnessed steep mid-level lapse rates, plentiful instability, around 50 kts of effective shear. and decent helicity. This type of atmosphere supported all weather hazards. Recent heavy rainfall events also heightened a flood threat. The severe threat continued into the next day as a line of storms rolled through just after midnight into the next day.

This tornado began in far southern Madison County along Sanderson Road where several trees were uprooted. The tornado continued eastward along Hailey Road where numerous trees were uprooted or snapped. The first sign of structural damage occurred to the carport of a home on Bowman Road just west of Kelly Road with more widespread and significant tree damage in the field just behind the house. Several trees were uprooted along Swink Road but almost none of the adjacent structures had any damage. Fairly widespread tree damage continued in a rural area on Lowery and Cain Roads as it moved into Chester County. The most significant damage occurred to two houses just off Highway 18, close to the Hardeman County Line. Peak winds were estimated at 95 mph. One house had partial uplift of the roof and notable loss of paneling from the second story. A second house had a tree collapse onto a garage, major uplift of a patio roof, and its chimney collapsed on the side of the house. In many places, the tree damage was sporadic |and consistent with a broad circulation. The tornado dissipated as it moved across the very northeast corner of Hardeman County and into Chester County. The tornado eventually lifted in a heavily forested area.

A weak tornado that caused damage in southern Madison County crossed into the extreme northeast corner of Hardeman County. The tornado knocked down some trees before traveling into Chester County.

A weak tornado crossed from Hardeman County into Chester County knocking down trees. The tornado eventually lifted in a heavily forested area.

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 tornado watch, issued at 03:39 UTC and running to 06:47 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 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 00:57 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 Memphis radar (KNQA), 89 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:54 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 2024 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

69 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 70 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.