EF-1 Tornado Strikes Pittsylvania County

Weather Pattern Overview:

A strong fall cold front (Figure 1) with marginal instability and strong shear, pushed across the Appalachians during the late afternoon and evening hours on Nov 16. There were lots of showers well ahead of the front (Figure 2). Only a few breaks in clouds occurred in our area, and a more significant tornado outbreak occurred farther south in SC and south of Winston-Salem, NC with more isolated but shallow supercells. A disorganized line coming off the Blue Ridge strengthened and also developed bowing segments and some weak rotational signatures (Figure 3) at times as it moved into the Virginia Piedmont. An EF1 tornado occurred near Dry Fork, Virginia with one of the bows, with straight line wind damage with another.

Tornado Summary:

An EF1 tornado, touched down just south of Dry Fork, In Pittsylvania County Virginia, near White Oak Mountain Road. Numerous trees were snapped and uprooted in this area. The tornado tracked east-northeast and touched down intermittently. The tornado hit the unique industries company at the intersection of U.S. Highway 29 and Toy Lane. Here, an estimated 100 mph tornadic wind ripped three large ventilation units off the roof, and the roof itself
sustained damage. Two tractor trailers by the business were overturned. The tornado lastly touched down across U.S. Highway 29, where it caused minor damage to the roof of a house.
See map below for the track of the storm and click on the colored pins for photos. Below that is a table of the tornado details.

Historically, this is the 4th documented tornado to occur in November for our forecast area. The other three were in Yadkin and Stokes County 11/22/1992, and Charlotte County, 11/23/1992.

Surface Analysis at 4 pm on November 16th, showing a cold front entering the western sections of the Blacksburg Forecast Area.

 

 

Radar showing showers across the area around 4 pm, November 16th

 

Eastern U.S. Rainfall Totals


 

 

 

 



View Pittsylvania County November 16, 2011 EF1 Tornado in a larger map

...TORNADO CONFIRMED NEAR JUST SOUTH OF DRY FORK IN PITTSYLVANIA
COUNTY VIRGINIA...

LOCATION...JUST SOUTH OF DRY FORK IN PITTSYLVANIA COUNTY VIRGINIA
DATE...NOVEMBER 16 2011
ESTIMATED START TIME...06:55 PM EST
ESTIMATED END TIME.....06:58 PM EST
MAXIMUM EF-SCALE RATING...EF1
ESTIMATED MAXIMUM WIND SPEED...100 MPH
MAXIMUM PATH WIDTH...125 YARDS
PATH LENGTH...INTERMITTENTLY 2.3 MILES
BEGINNING LAT/LONG...36.725N / 79.427W
ENDING LAT/LONG......36.732N / 79.381W
* FATALITIES...0
* INJURIES...0

* THE INFORMATION IN THIS STATEMENT IS PRELIMINARY AND SUBJECT TO
CHANGE PENDING FINAL REVIEW OF THE EVENT(S) AND PUBLICATION IN
NWS STORM DATA.


FOR REFERENCE...THE ENHANCED FUJITA SCALE CLASSIFIES TORNADOES INTO
THE FOLLOWING CATEGORIES:

EF0...WIND SPEEDS 65 TO 85 MPH.
EF1...WIND SPEEDS 86 TO 110 MPH.
EF2...WIND SPEEDS 111 TO 135 MPH.
EF3...WIND SPEEDS 136 TO 165 MPH.
EF4...WIND SPEEDS 166 TO 200 MPH.
EF5...WIND SPEEDS GREATER THAN 200 MPH.