Surface Observations View Storm Report Graphical National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Gov. The town was incorporated in 1845. The NWS Memphis lists 3:44 pm CDT as the time of formation. Unauthorized use is prohibited. The first tornado producing storms to move across the Mid-South developed in Southwestern Arkansas during the late afternoon hours of April 25th. At this point, 12 of the tornadoes were violent (EF4, EF5) with most of these having a path length greater than 70 miles. Radar loop from 7:01 a.m. to 11:03 p.m. CT, April 27, 2011, illustrating the three rounds of severe t-storms in the Deep South and Tennessee Valley. Jesse Cox, 85, died in the house, and his wife, Nell Cox, 75, was seriously injured when an EF5 tornado swept through the town on April 27, 2011. Please select one of the following: Local KNQA Standard Radar (low bandwidth), Local KGWX Standard Radar (low bandwidth), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. One of the EF-5 tornadoes of the outbreak occurred across northern Mississippi, near Smithville. The Smithville High School softball team has won the 1A state championship in 2008, 2011, and 2012. Extreme damage at a residence along Highway 25 near Smithville, with part of the foundation slab pulled up and dislodged slightly. However, this system spawned threeEF-5 tornadoes in only a four-day span in addition to 12 EF-4s and 21 EF-3s. The 2011 Smithville EF5 tornado is one of the strongest tornadoes in recorded history, and this video aims to cover every second of the storm, from genesis to dissipation. 27 tornado count differs from that shown in map above. Become a Patron! Columbus AFB, Climate Mr. Estis died that evening when his heart gave out. While the Deep South - Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia and Tennessee - bore the brunt of it, tornadoes were reported as far north as central New York. About half of the deathsfrom 2000 through 2019 were from tornadoes rated EF4 or EF5. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. The super tornado outbreak from April 25-28, 2011, resulted in two EF5 tornadoes in Mississippi (Smithville and Philadelphia), 358 tornadoes across the South and 324 deaths. For every 100 females, there were 95.1 males. Tornado tracks, Enhanced Fujita scale ratings and county fatalities on Apr. At this time, roughly 342 people lost their lives, with thousands moreinjured. As the storm crossed Davis Road South, the ground was deeply scoured in a nearby field, leaving a trench in the ground that was still visible in aerial photographs taken more than a year later. Scientists attribute at least part of the 2011 Super Outbreaks notoriety to chance. And an unshakeable sense of faith. The frequency has ranged from several tornadoes rated this magnitude in a single year to multi-year periods with none. Around 5:20 a.m. CDT, a tornado intensified quickly as it tracked into the city of just over 2,000 residents. Local Then I bent over and I cried like a baby. The radar was replaced later in 2011 and the church reopened in a new location. Submit a Storm Report [2], After producing a long-tracked EF3 tornado that passed near New Wren, the same supercell produced this tornado that began 3 miles (4.8km) west-southwest of Smithville along the TennesseeTombigbee Waterway near the Glover Wilkins Lock at 3:42p.m. CDT (2042 UTC), snapping numerous trees near the Smithville Recreation Area. Conditions cleared up across the Mid-South during the late morning hours on the 26th. We apologize for any inconvenience. [3] Ample instability, low-level moisture, and wind shear fueled a significant tornado outbreak from Texas to Tennessee; at least 64tornadoes touched down on this day. The tornado had estimated winds of 205 mph (330 km/hr), destroyed 18 homes, and . Science/Training Threeadditional supercells produced tornadoes, very large hail, and wind damage across Phillips, Coahoma, and Tunica counties during this same time frame. In fact, the first EF-5 of the outbreak developed near Smithville, Mississippi. The tornado moved northeast through Itawamba County before it crossed into . To make use of these warnings yourself, pay attention to the severe weather alerts issued over your radio, television, weather radio, and cellular devices. Newspaper clips are embedded via newspapers.com. Nobody in the house was badly hurt. Observed Precipitation One focuses on the Smithville, MS side. On March 3, 2019, an EF4 tornado struck Lee County, Alabama, making it the first EF4 or stronger tornado in the U.S. in nearly two years. The bow echo raced across central and eastern Arkansas and crossed the Mississippi River at around 10 pm on the 25th. study concluded power outages caused by the morning pair of squall lines, including non-functioning outdoor sirens and NOAA weather radio transmitter outages, reduced the ability to get warnings out to the public during the most deadly afternoon and evening supercells in central and northern Alabama. 2 in the definitive April 27 outbreak BAMS paper from Knupp, et al. In addition, the EF4 in early March in Alabama killed 23 people, making it the deadliest tornado since the Moore, Oklahoma, EF5 tornado in 2013. The driving force for the 3rd event was a potent shortwave and deep surface low that intensified during the day Wednesday. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.79% of the population. Graphical A semi truck was torn apart with the only remaining piece found 1.4 miles away. About Us. An earlier starting position determined by treefall analysis combined with radar data gives a start time of 3:40 p.m. CDT. [11] Several additional homes were damaged and a chicken house was destroyed as the tornado approached Franklin County. see Fig. According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 1.6 square miles (4.1km2), of which 1.5 square miles (3.9km2) is land and 0.1 square miles (0.26km2) (8.12%) is water. Almost 350 tornadoes tore through the U.S. in a four-day span from April 25-28, 2011. Tar and chip pavement was torn from a road in town and rolled into piles, intense ground scouring was noted in several areas, and a 1965 Chevrolet pickup truck was thrown from one residence and never found. His mother, just out of the shower, was covered in a quilt. Smithville, a spot of a town of about 1,000 where first names suffice and Bibles lie within reach, endured a direct hit from Wednesdays tornado in Mississippi. Debris cleanup in Tuscaloosa alone cost $100 million. A total of 303 tornado warnings were issued by the six most-affected National Weather Service Forecast offices on April 27, 2011, alone. US Dept of Commerce Weather Radio April U.S. tornado counts from 2011 through 2019. And while communities throughout. County: Monroe, Itawamba (MS)/ Marion, Franklin (AL), SPC Coordinates: Start: 34.0455/-88.4450 End: 34.3226/-87.8924. Furthermore, convective available potential energy (CAPE) values reached 2,5003,000J/kg1. Additionally, this marks the first time since statistics have been kept that two EF5 tornadoes have been recorded on the same day in Mississippi, with the tornado in Smithville also rated as an EF5. Fire We know there is a tremendous amount of debris, and the possibility that the waterways surrounding this area contain human remains, Mr. Barbour said. Mayor Gregg Kennedy said one person remained missing Saturday in the town of 900, which was mostly flattened. In April 1974, an even more powerful outbreak took place, producing more intense tornadoesEF-3s to EF-5sthan the 2011 Super Outbreak. The morning t-storm cluster typically produces damaging winds, flooding rain, perhaps a few tornadoes. The significant tornado parameter (STP) uses a combination of both wind shear and instability in lowest levels to diagnose the tornado risk. With a special, battery-powered receiver that can be acquired from most hardware stores or online, you can tune into this 24/7 radio stationeven in the middle of a power outage. This scale is an upgraded version of the original Fujita Scale developed in 1971 by Dr. Ted Fujita, a University of Chicago severe storms research scientist. (Weather Geeks (The Weather Channel), James Spann (ABC 33/40)), (Mississippi Emergency Management Agency/NWS-Memphis, Tennessee), Northern Lights Dance Over National Park In Alaska, New York City Sees First Inch-Plus Snowfall Of The Season, Cold Or Flu? We've compiled a list of the most jaw-dropping facets of this outbreak that we'll never forget. There was death on either side of me., In Mississippi, Little Town Is Staggered by a Tornados Direct Hit, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/30/us/30smithville.html. StormReady HWY 25 southwest of Smithville, MS This is the longest-streak without an EF5/F5 tornado since records began in 1950. [2], Activity on April27 was precipitated by a 995mbar (hPa; 29.39inHg) surface low situated over Kentucky and a deep, negatively tilted (aligned northwest to southeast) trough over Arkansas and Louisiana. Experiences of Smithville, Mississippi Residents with the 27 April 2011 Tornado Volume 36 Number 2 ~ December 2012 95 it is still not recommended, especially in the Southeast where tornado visibility is reduced (Ashley 2007). StormReady Pray, pray, pray! shouted his mother, Marcie Pearce, as the tornado hit the house. (Photo by Carmen K. Sisson/Cloudybright) Sunday morning . On April 27, another tornado tracked almost fivemiles through Chattanooga, Tennessee, causing eightfatalities and injuring tenothers. Nine Ways To Tell The Difference. National Data Hydrology Nearly all of the storms produced tornadoes, with many of them long track and significant. An incredible 343 tornadoes were spawned over just over 72 hours from April 25-28, 2011, according to NOAA. A study by the Centers for Disease Control and the Red Cross found 89.5 percent of the deaths in this outbreak were from these violent tornadoes. [7] The town is situated along the east bank of Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway in northern Monroe County. In roughly 90 minutes, the EF4 tornado claimed 65 lives along an 80-mile path from Greene County, Alabama, through Tuscaloosa into the northern suburbs of Birmingham. Both the radar and radome encasing the radar were blown off and destroyed, leaving just the tower standing. Why? National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Aviation Two power plants were forced to shut down, including the TVA's Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant near Decatur, Alabama. Over 300 transmission towers were mangled on April 27, 2011. A NOAA Weather Radio is another critical source for emergency information. * LOCATION/TIME OF EVENT: SMITHVILLE AT 344 PM CDT ON APRIL 27 2011 * BEGINNING POINT: 34.0455, -88.44497 * ENDING POINT: 34.3129, -87.9231 * RATING: EF-5 * ESTIMATED PEAK WIND: 205 MPH * PATH LENGTH: 35.1 MILES /CONTINUES INTO SHOTTSVILLE ALABAMA SEGMENT/ * MAXIMUM WIDTH: 3/4 MILE /WIDENED TO MATCH SHOTTSVILLE TORNADO SEGMENT/ * FATALITIES: 15 Storm Reports The exchange student from Belgium who was living with the family was in the corner. Cinder blocks from the structure were broken into small pieces of concrete and strewn throughout a nearby field. Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth for the entire late April 2011 Tornado Outbreak: Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth for Monday night, April 25th: Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth for Tuesday evening, April 26th: Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth for early Wednesday morning, April 27th: Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth for Wednesday afternoon, April 27th: CURRENT HAZARDS A total of 59 tornadoes have been rated this intensity since 1950. The SPC/NCDC lists the starting point as 3 miles WSW of Smithville. Meteorologist and researcher Jon Davies blogged about the rarity of seeing such extreme values of shear and unstable air. The average household size 2.42 and the average family size 3.03. Surface Observations Of those 21, 11 were rated as strong (EF2, EF3) tornadoes and had fairly long path lengths. Dubbed the Super Outbreak of 2011, these storms took the. Hazard Outlook, CURRENT CONDITIONS One-hundred-year-old oak trees toppled in seconds. The tornado reached an estimated maximum width of 3/4 of a mile, (1.2 km) with wind speeds up to 205 mph (330 km/h). Questions or comments about this summary? Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Apr 25, 2011 0600 UTC Day 1 Convective Outlook, Apr 26, 2011 0600 UTC Day 1 Convective Outlook, "The Smithville, MS EF-5 Tornado April 27, 2011", "Deadly tornado destroyed town, not spirit, of tiny Smithville, Miss", "Franklin County Alabama (Hodges Area) EF-2", "Shottsville (Marion County) EF-3 Tornado April 27, 2011", "Extreme damage incidents in the 27 April 2011 tornado superoutbreak", http://www.srh.noaa.gov/meg/?n=apr2011toroutbreaksmithville, https://web.archive.org/web/20160520115254/http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/storms/apr11_tornado/, http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/stormevents/eventdetails.jsp?id=303562, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmI_2iYuchc, http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2011/oct/23/deadly-tornado-smithville-mississippi, http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/stormevents/eventdetails.jsp?id=303563, http://www.srh.noaa.gov/hun/?n=4272011_franklin_county_hodges, http://www.srh.noaa.gov/bmx/?n=event_04272011shotsville, List of tornadoes in the 2011 Super Outbreak, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2011_Smithville,_Mississippi,_tornado&oldid=1140562379, 2011 natural disasters in the United States, Articles with dead external links from January 2023, Articles with dead external links from December 2022, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 20 February 2023, at 17:19. Radar Before photo courtesy of Google Earth and after photo taken April 29, 2011, from NOAAs King Air Aircraft, courtesy of the National Geodetic Survey. Despite the deadly toll, we'll never truly know how many lives were saved by timely National Weather Service warnings, and the considerable effort of the media to communicate those warnings. Here are all of the tornado tracks across the Midsouth. Local AHPS This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM. The combination that resulted was an extremely rare mix of instability and wind shear. Air Quality, RIVERS AND LAKES Preliminary local storm reports for April 27th. Education For a quick comparison, the Super Outbreak of April 3-4, 1974 produced 148 tornadoes. Their ears felt close to bursting. Take control of your data. Turned soil from a violent EF5 tornado that destroyed portions of Neshoba, Kemper, Winston, and Noxubee counties in Mississippi on April 27, 2011. 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