Tornadoes · United States · Virginia · 2025
EF1 tornado, Halifax County, Virginia, September 4, 2025
This EF1 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Halifax County on September 4, 2025, touching down at 4:51 PM EDT and reaching 225 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $75,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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.
The record
- Rating
- EF1
- Date
- September 4, 2025
- Touchdown
- 4:51 PM EDT (20:51 UTC)
- Lifted
- 4:52 PM EDT (20:52 UTC)
- On the ground
- 1 minutes
- Path length
- 0.3 miles (0.5 km)
- Path width
- 225 yards (206 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $75,000
- County
- Halifax County
- Touchdown point
- 36.637, -78.887
- Lift-off point
- 36.637, -78.882
- Record number
- 2509041451-01
The surface observations
South Boston (W78), 9 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 00:00 UTC |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Raleigh/Durham radar (KRAX), 114 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:53 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.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2025 tornado in VirginiaEvery tornado in Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in Virginia nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of September 4, 2025
4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 4 | 5:57 PM EDT | EF0 | Oneida, NY | 3.0 | 100 | $13,000 | ||
| September 4 | 6:29 PM CDT | EF0 | Nicollet, MN | 3.5 | 40 | $5,000 | ||
| September 4 | 6:45 PM CDT | EF0 | Nicollet, MN | 1.0 | 40 | |||
| September 4 | 9:31 PM EDT | EF0 | Lancaster, PA | 0.1 | 30 | $10,000 |
What this means
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.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.