EF0 tornado, Berryville, Virginia, May 30, 2017

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 30, 2017

Touchdown

5:59 PM EDT (21:59 UTC)

Lifted

6:01 PM EDT (22:01 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.5 miles (0.7 km)

Path width

25 yards (23 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Clarke County

Touchdown point

39.168, -77.999

Lift-off point

39.167, -77.990

Record number

1705301559-01

A boundary stalled over the area. Warm and humid conditions ahead of the boundary led to an unstable atmosphere. Showers and thunderstorms developed, and some thunderstorms became severe due to the instability and strong winds aloft.

The National Weather Service in Baltimore MD/Washington DC has confirmed through storm survey and radar analysis the touchdown of a brief, EF-0 tornado near Berryville in Clarke County Virginia on May 30, 2017.||Damage began near the intersection of Trapp Hill Road and Harry Byrd Highway (Route 7), with an oak tree uprooted, falling to the east along a driveway leading to an estate home on Trapp Hill Road.||This area has hilly terrain, and it appears that the tornado skipped a few valleys before doing more damage in the 1000 block of Trapp Hill Road. At a residence in the 1000 block of Trapp Hill Road, numerous large branches were down, along with uprooted hardwood trees. The protective coverings of a wood pile was strewn towards the south, whereas leave splatter at the residence was observed on both the northwest and southwest portion of the structure. Finally, one 18-inch diameter pine tree was snapped at about 30 feet off the surface, and with the snapped portion of |the tree falling to the west. The magnitude and chaotic nature of tree damage in this localized area is consistent with tornadic damage at the EF-0 scale, with estimated winds 65 mph.||The KLWX WSR-88D Weather Radar located in Sterling, Virginia, exhibited a pronounced hook echo in the 0.5 angle reflectivity products starting at 5:53 PM EDT, and continuing through 6:02 PM EDT. While hook echoes in of themselves do not constitute proof of a tornado, it does provide corroborating evidence that is|consistent with the damage path.||The residents of the impacted household were subscribed to the Clarke County Citizen Alert System, and were notified via telephone and text message of the Tornado Warning that was issued in advance of this storm. This provided them several minutes to move to the basement of their home, decreasing their risk of injury due to the tornado. The National Weather Service Baltimore/Washington Weather Forecast Office encourages citizens throughout the area to take advantage of their countys emergency notification services.||The National Weather Service would like to thank the residents who reported the damage and helped survey the area; the Clarke County Department of Fire, EMS, Emergency Management; and the Virginia Department of Emergency Management for coordination.

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

2 minutes of warning. NWS LWX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:57 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:16 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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:12 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.

Winchester Regional (OKV), 13 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Sterling radar (KLWX), 49 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:58 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 2017 tornado in VirginiaEvery tornado in Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in Virginia nowThe forecast where you are

4 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.