EF3 tornado, Snydersville to Henry Fork, Virginia, April 19, 2019

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 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 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. 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

EF3

Date

April 19, 2019

Touchdown

10:25 AM EDT (14:25 UTC)

Lifted

10:37 AM EDT (14:37 UTC)

On the ground

12 minutes

Path length

8.1 miles (13.0 km)

Path width

250 yards (229 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$650,000

County

Franklin County

Touchdown point

36.856, -79.891

Lift-off point

36.963, -79.830

Record number

1904190825-01

19 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS RNK, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF3. The highest wind the damage implies is 159 mph.

• well built home...solid connection to foundation

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

A strong area of low pressure moved from the Mississippi Valley into the Tennessee Valley. The atmosphere in advance of this system was ripe for the development of rotating thunderstorms. Some of these storms produced damaging winds. However, two thunderstorms increased in enough rotational intensity to generate tornadoes. An EF3 Tornado occurred in Franklin County and an EF1 tornado occurred in Bedford County.

A tornado touched down just to the north of Oak Level. It then moved northeastward, significantly damaging three structures while heavily damaging or destroying ten outbuildings. The tornado reached a peak intensity of EF-3 near Windy Ridge Road and again near Sealtest Lane. The tornado eventually dissipated to the east of Henry Fork, four miles southeast of Rocky Mount, just short of Doe Run Road. Two individuals received minor injuries due to the tornado. One of the fallen trees landed on a house and a car. Damage values are estimated.

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

22 minutes of warning. NWS RNK issued a tornado warning for this county at 14:03 UTC, 22 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 14:30 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 12:53 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.

Martinsville (MTV), 34 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Roanoke radar (KFCX), 39 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 14:25 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 VirginiaEvery tornado in Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in Virginia nowThe forecast where you are

44 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.