EF1 tornado, Black Earth to Verona, Wisconsin, July 28, 2021

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

July 28, 2021

Touchdown

12:47 AM CDT (05:47 UTC)

Lifted

12:50 AM CDT (05:50 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

2.4 miles (3.9 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Dane County

Touchdown point

43.076, -89.587

Lift-off point

43.042, -89.571

Record number

2107282347-01

40 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS MKX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

• Pine tree partially uprooted to the southeast with minor fascia damage to house. Multiple large tree branches down in area. Corn field north of house has evident tornado path via drone footage from EM.
• Pine tree topped and large branches taken off hardwoods in front yard of house.
• Pine tree down, with pine topped across the street and basketball hoop knocked over. Also gutter removed from house northwest corner of house and deposited across the street to the south.
• Rotten tree snapped at base, multiple large branches down. From golf course personnel, multiple trees damaged on back 9 to the northwest of this location.

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

A round of severe storms tracked into southwest Wisconsin during the early morning hours on July 28th. Followed by another round of stronger, more widespread thunderstorms that begin to dive south across central Wisconsin late in the evening on July 28th through the early morning hours on July 29th.

This was 1 of 17 tornadoes to occur in Wisconsin on the night of July 28th into the early morning hours of July 29th. This was the 6th overall tornado for the event.|A line of storms developed in northern Wisconsin and pushed south into southern Wisconsin in the overnight hours of the 28th into the 29th of July with mainly brief tornadoes and damaging winds occurring. This tornado began northeast of Black Earth in the Marsh Valley and tracked to the south through the center of Cross Plains. There wasn't much in the way of structural damage from this tornado, rather consistent tree damage from the start point through to the south side of Cross Plains.

This was 1 of 17 tornadoes to occur in Wisconsin on the night of July 28th into the early morning hours of July 29th. This was the 7th overall tornado for the event.|A line of storms developed in northern Wisconsin and pushed south into southern Wisconsin in the overnight hours of the 28th into the 29th of July with mainly brief tornadoes and damaging winds occurring. ||This tornado began to the east of Cross Plains, tracked south across Highway 14 toward Cross Plains State Park where it ended up on south side of the park. The main tree damage was between Highway 14 and Stagecoach Rd southeast of Cross Plains near Black Earth Creek.

This was 1 of 17 tornadoes to occur in Wisconsin on the night of July 28th into the early morning hours of July 29th. This was the 9th overall tornado for the event. A line of storms developed in northern Wisconsin and pushed south into southern Wisconsin in the overnight hours of the 28th into the 29th of July with mainly brief tornadoes and damaging winds occurring. ||This tornado began near the Town of Middleton along Old Sauk Rd and went through some subdivisions before ending south of Valley View Rd.

This was 1 of 17 tornadoes to occur in Wisconsin on the night of July 28th into the early morning hours of July 29th. This was the 10th overall tornado for the event.|A line of storms developed in northern Wisconsin and pushed south into southern Wisconsin in the overnight hours of the 28th into the 29th of July with mainly brief tornadoes and damaging winds occurring. ||This tornado began in the Town of Middleton near Old Sauk Rd and went south, through Mineral Point Rd and ended south of Valley View Rd and west of Meadow Rd. Tree damage was noted along the path, as well as some loss of roofing materials in the newer subdivision along Mineral Point Rd.

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

4 minutes of warning. NWS MKX issued a tornado warning for this county at 05:43 UTC, 4 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 06:15 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 00:22 UTC and running to 07:00 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 01:04 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 Milwaukee radar (KMKX), 84 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:47 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 2021 tornado in WisconsinEvery tornado in Wisconsin since 1950Warnings in force in Wisconsin nowThe forecast where you are

10 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.