On Wednesday, we had multiple possible tornadoes touch down in Middle Tennessee.
On Thursday and Friday, National Weather Service crews have been out surveying the damage from the storms, and confirming tornado paths and damage. We'll update this story as more confirmations are made.
Columbia / Maury County
An EF3 tornado with 140 mph winds touched down. It caused one death and at least one injury.
The tornado touched down along the Duck River east of Columbia and it lifted near Kedron Road.
Its width was 900 yards, and it was 12 miles long. The tornado reached its peak speeds at Blackburn Road and Lasea Road.
Robertson County
An EF1 tornado touched down in Springfield in Robertson County, moving at 90 mph.
The path width was 150 yards and 4.88 miles long.
Rutherford County
An EF0 tornado moved through Eagleville around 6:30 p.m. at about 80 mph, touching down near the intersection of Threet Road and New Zion Road and uprooting several trees. It continued east along Jones Road and eventually transitioned into straight-line winds near the Gray Fox neighborhood, according to NWS.
It was 2.95 miles in length and 100 yards in width.
Giles County
An EF2 tornado moved through Prospect on May 8th. Its width was 600 yards and traveled for 5.7 miles.
One critical injury was a result of this tornado. It stopped just west of I-65.
Lincoln County
The National Weather Service surveyed tornado damage in Lincoln County and found patterns matching an EF1 tornado.
The Huntsville office found damage in the southwestern portion of the county.
Max wind speeds were 105 mph.
Four more EF1 tornadoes were confirmed in Lincoln County on Wednesday, May 15, for a total of five tornadoes in the county.
Benton County
An EF0 tornado swept through Benton County at 85 mph — 1.31 miles long and 100 yards wide. There were no fatalities or injuries, only significant tree damage, according to NWS.
EF Scale from NWS:
EF0.....65 to 85 mph
EF1.....86 to 110 mph
EF2.....111 to 135 mph
EF3.....136 to 165 mph
EF4.....166 to 200 mph
EF5.....200 mph
The National Weather Service has teams surveying the damage throughout the counties that were impacted by the May 8 storms. NWS offices in Memphis and Louisville are helping survey in Columbia, Springfield, Perry and Lewis Counties on May 9. On May 10, teams will be headed to Giles, Smith and Warren Counties.
"After that, there will be a lot of clean-up and figuring out the "what's left" as we theoretically could have some areas we need to look further into whether the damage was straight-line winds or brief spin-up tornado or both," NWS Nashville shared.
All of this data is preliminary and subject to change! It will take a few days to complete this survey.
