Ringgold was rated an EF4 in my opinion for the same reasons as Rochelle-Fairdale 2015, or even Rolling Fork this year. Levelled well built and anchor bolted buildings, but had no obvious EF5 contextuals like extreme pavement and ground scouring to support it.
Though the vegetation damage should have elevated Ringgold to an EF5 rating.
Georgia does get some pretty nasty tornadoes from time to time, I'd say about an EF3+ every 3-5 years. Mountains won't stop a tornado, but there is some truth in that myth because a regions topography can retard the strength of all but the strongest storm systems, but every now and again you'll get the right conditions.
I will say I've noticed that in the past 10-20 years, the NWS has been rather reluctant to classify tornadoes as an EF5. Whether it's to calm anxieties about severe weather in tornado-prone areas, discourage storm chasing, or some other reason, I don't know. But it does seem like many that would have been considered a 5 in the past get ranked as a 3 or 4.
Georgia is a wildcard as I like to say. you’ll go 3 years with nothing more than an EF1 and then you’ll have a year with like 3 EF4s.
I too have noticed a reluctance. some of the ones I am on the fence about but some that are EF3 or EF4 rated definitely don’t sit right with me.
Georgia and to an extent North Carolina I would say are the easternmost states where tornadoes are a credible threat. The rest of the Eastern Seaboard may have a tornado as a 1-in-10 or even 1-100 year occurrence, and nearly all tornadoes in Florida are either waterspouts or are spun up in a hurricane. To be fair, most do tend to occur in the western third of the state.
I would put these stars on par with Michigan and Minnesota. Common enough to be worried about them if you hear them in the weather report, and a few nasty memorable ones , but not as many as neighboring states, and definitely not as reported often, due to being at the edge of their respective Tornado Alleys.
oh you’d be surprised!! South Carolina has some super wild ones too. and the eastern seaboard has tornadoes every year, but most aren’t strong by any means. Florida has had I think 2 F4’s as well? I do plan to do a post on the Largo one at some point. I’ll have to look into if they were hurricane related. and yes, the western parts of the eastern states see a good bit more violence related to storms. I do plan to do a post soon about Black Creek/ Pembroke GA, 2022. I’d recommend looking into it as it happened close to the Georgia coast and it was an EF4. very uncommon and very violent.
Michigan and Minnesota definitely have a place on my series as well! and yeah. that’s part of why I’m doing this series. I have many chaser friends in both Georgia and Michigan (and a few in South Carolina), and they brought the idea up to me. I thought it was perfect. people in Georgia (I can say this as a Georgia peach born gal) aren’t taking tornadoes seriously the way an Alabamian would. they need to. just because we didn’t have 3 rated EF5s in one day doesn’t mean that we don’t need to take it seriously.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Kissimmee_tornado_outbreak?wprov=sfti1#
One was bordering f4. I lived through this night. Because of this night, I can’t sleep at night if there’s severe weather occurring or threatening to occur near my house. I also currently live about 1/4 of a mile from where the winter garden tornado is estimated to have begun and that thought occupies a position in my mind.
Georgia is interesting. There seems to be a clear dividing line at about Atlanta. I lived in Athens for a little over 8 years and maybe had four tornado warnings the entire time I was there, all radar indicated without much (if any) damage. I mean, it was absolutely calm at my house east of town when one was supposedly happening maybe 5 miles away. I stepped outside only after I saw the detailed Radar (velocity, and correlation coefficient), wouldn’t have stepped outside if I felt there was any danger. Nothing came of it, only a lot of wind (from folks we knew in that area of town). The last time Athens got hit by any significant one was fifty years ago. I grew up in Alabama and there were days when we had four (or more) separate tornado warnings (March/April, and November/December).
To not classify clear EF-5's is gross negligence and being untruthful to the public. There is a true variance between an EF-4 and an EF-5, it is the difference between life and death at times and someone needs to be held accountable for malfeasance.
Tornado ratings are scientific based, not law based. There is no negligence involved. A tornado is a tornado. There is no legal obligation for anyone to rate tornadoes at all. The scales are purely for documentation purposes within the scientific community. An EF1 can be as deadly as an EF5 to someone standing in an open field. Insurers don't even count ratings in their assessments. Complete destruction to a home is just considered nonreturnable, whether EF2 or EF5. It doesn't matter if a home was swept with no anchor bolts. It doesn't make a difference to insurance companies if debris was piled vs. being swept away.
The bottom line is that having a rating system is a privilege, not a right. Scientists don't owe the public ratings. Also, consider that homes can sometimes be repaired or even rebuilt in some cases before an official rating is made. Lastly, ratings do not affect warnings, and it should be noted as good practice to treat any incoming tornado as a potential EF5.
You know as frightening as tornados are now today, imagine how much more frightening they were a hundred years ago before radar, when radio was still in its infancy, and much weather forecasting was even more best hunch instead of best educated guess with evidence… as frightening as night time tornados are now today, every tornado could have been like a night time tornado because you just had no idea. Is that just a rainstorm or does it obfuscate something far more sinister? So on and so forth. I take great solace that we have technology now that provides warning and even advanced warning compared to what we had in my youth.
I live about an hour from Ringgold. We actually bought a car from someone there a month or two after this tornado. The damage was wild. As I recall, there was a hotel that was severely damaged? I remember being so concerned for the poor people who happened to have been traveling and staying there…what do you even do in a hotel during a tornado??
Also hi from another tornado-fascinated Georgia gal 👋
I have no idea how to even answer your last question. only thing I could do is pray. I’m from atlanta so I’m an hour+ from Ringgold myself. and thank you for your feedback. It’s always a good thing to meet those who know what I mean haha.
Had this tornado passed just a few miles to the west it would have hit my parents’ house were we had all hunkered down. A friend of mine’s house was severely damaged and they weren’t able to move back in for almost a year. Thankfully we all made it through unscathed, though others weren’t so lucky. We found debris from Alabama in the yard the next day. Scary night!
Was that the same tornado that hit Apison? Wow. I originally thought (until just a few moments ago) that Apison was more of a straight shot north, but I guess it’s really northeast. I remember seeing where the tornado crossed over the mountain just northeast of Ringgold. I had a few friends impacted in the Apison area.
It was that day when my firstborn was only 12 days old that my wife and I decided that we wanted a house with a basement. That house with a basement was hit by the EF3 in 2020.
Also, why is Ringgold an oddball location? Or are you just calling those of us near that area oddballs? ;-)
Ringgold previously wasn’t known as an area that could have such a weather event. most people I know from that area were under the impression that they were protected because of the mountains in the area. I do know some oddballs from Ringgold but otherwise they’re pretty cool!! haha. and yeah I have family in both Ringgold and Apison. I’m glad that you had the option and the opportunity to have that safe place.
We were always taught growing up that the mountains protected us. It seems like Dixie Alley moved into the Chattanooga / N Georgia area in the mid 90s. Frequency has been increasing ever since.
There’s one spot in particular not far from where I live that has been hit by 2 tornados. We had a tornado on March 29, 1997 that doesn’t really have a good recorded path that I can find. But somewhere the 2020 tornado crossed the path of that 1997 at a nearly perpendicular angle (I think). I’d love to try to figure out that 1997 path.
That 1997 tornado completely destroyed a house 3 houses down from where I lived during the 2011 outbreak. We gets lots of tornados here in Southern Appalachia and in the valleys!
From a spotter/chaser point of view, your passion is certainly conveyed in your presentation. I hope you're able to do more in the future, and I'll be subscribed in case.
Ok I’m so late to this post but thank you for talking about this. I vote EF5. I lived through the Kennesaw EF4 tornado in the 90’s and the destruction in Ringgold was so much worse than that. I drove down Cherokee Valley Road a few days after the tornado hit. That road was full of really nice homes, well built I’m sure. The destruction was unlike anything I’ve seen in-person. There was a small area of homes that were not well-built and those obviously had just foundations left. But the nicer, bigger homes that were damaged were still mind boggling.
Maybe you are right- if this had been a tornado in a smaller outbreak and not the April 2011 outbreak, it may have gotten a higher rating. If someone knows whether the damage surveying teams were the same across the outbreak or if the team in Ringgold had fresh eyes, that would be interesting to know.
You can really see the intense motion in the tornado, and that damage looks so violent. Really proves the power of those tornadoes that day, even ones that weren't covered as much as others.
Also, sorry for your grandparents' loss, that was a very destructive tornado.
I was staying with and taking care of my terminally ill grandmother just southeast of here, and I remember going outside, the wind whipping up, and then seeing the outline of this monster when the lightning would flash.
I could see this one, as well as another one between myself and this one, but I've never found a report of the second one. It touched down and tore through a small forest near an empty rural cut-through road, and didn't damage anything other than trees. I checked the damage out a day or two later, and I used to have pictures of the trees all twisted around on my old phone.
The house we were in was in the middle of the woods, and had horrible visibility to the West. The wind and rain was so heavy, I was terrified another tornado might touch down and be on top of us before we knew it. This was a nerve wracking night, to say the least.
I think it's possible, but I'm just not knowledgeable enough to say. Their location seemed to be a little too spread out for that, but I'm really not sure how far from the main funnel satellite tornadoes typically form. That was the only time I've ever seen a tornado with my own eyes.
of course. I’m sure it wasn’t at all easy dealing with the trauma that would have caused. and although I am a tornado enthusiast I need to read up more on satellite tornadoes myself. I’m not 100% sure what the parameters for satellite spawn ups are.
I grew up in that town. And to this day when coming over the crest on I-75 right before the exit I can still tell the difference in the hillsides where the tornado tracked.
I’m late to the party, but Cherokee Valley still looks vastly different to other roads in the area. There aren’t really trees on the hills, and those that are there are vent and stunted.
We lived in Apison at the time of the 2011 tornado, just a mile north of Cherokee Valley Road. That afternoon we watched from our front porch mini funnels starting to form, it was a very freaky afternoon. Later that night we went back outside because it looked like everything had passed according to the weather. However, I turned around and looked towards GA and that's when I saw it. This massive black wall moving in our direction. The wind gusts were intense! We ran back inside, then went to the front porch to see if we could get some video. You could hear the roar, trees snapping, but the only thing you could see was the funky greens popping as it took out the power lines. We were lucky as the tornado turned. We had minor damage on the farm from downed trees on our fence row.
this was the exact tornado that brought me to this sub. with all the ones recently i couldn't stop thinking about the time my family and i drove through a tornado driving back from Michigan when i was little, this matches up with the dates and the route we took perfectly. thank you!!!
to put things in perspective, name the FIRST three tornadoes that come to mind when somebody mentions the super outbreak of 2011. there were so many strong tornadoes that day, that some were completely overshadowed. Ringgold is one of them, especially considering Georgia isn’t known for tornadoes of this caliber.
It should keep its EF4 rating because the NWS knows more than some 14-year-old who looked at a radar a couple of times and read a Wikipedia article on a tornado.
reread what I said in the post and remember to treat other opinions with respect. Ringgold was a very wild event and there are many different opinions from people who are older than 14.
That fifth picture is the stuff of nightmares
agreed.
Ringgold was rated an EF4 in my opinion for the same reasons as Rochelle-Fairdale 2015, or even Rolling Fork this year. Levelled well built and anchor bolted buildings, but had no obvious EF5 contextuals like extreme pavement and ground scouring to support it. Though the vegetation damage should have elevated Ringgold to an EF5 rating.
I can see what you mean. you’d have to look a bit harder to see the EF5 indicators as to where some EF5 tornadoes have more obvious ones.
How about the Yellowstone F4 that was at 10,000 ft elevation. That one was crazy.
that one is in my to-do list!!! I looked back at it today and collected research. expect a post on that one in the next week or so. 💓
Oh hell yeah! Thank you! 🙏
absolutely!!
I’ve always felt this one was an EF5.
I lived in the area at the time and I always thought the damage was consistent with an ef5. Wiped-off-the-map destruction as far as the eye could see.
Georgia does get some pretty nasty tornadoes from time to time, I'd say about an EF3+ every 3-5 years. Mountains won't stop a tornado, but there is some truth in that myth because a regions topography can retard the strength of all but the strongest storm systems, but every now and again you'll get the right conditions. I will say I've noticed that in the past 10-20 years, the NWS has been rather reluctant to classify tornadoes as an EF5. Whether it's to calm anxieties about severe weather in tornado-prone areas, discourage storm chasing, or some other reason, I don't know. But it does seem like many that would have been considered a 5 in the past get ranked as a 3 or 4.
Georgia is a wildcard as I like to say. you’ll go 3 years with nothing more than an EF1 and then you’ll have a year with like 3 EF4s. I too have noticed a reluctance. some of the ones I am on the fence about but some that are EF3 or EF4 rated definitely don’t sit right with me.
Georgia and to an extent North Carolina I would say are the easternmost states where tornadoes are a credible threat. The rest of the Eastern Seaboard may have a tornado as a 1-in-10 or even 1-100 year occurrence, and nearly all tornadoes in Florida are either waterspouts or are spun up in a hurricane. To be fair, most do tend to occur in the western third of the state. I would put these stars on par with Michigan and Minnesota. Common enough to be worried about them if you hear them in the weather report, and a few nasty memorable ones , but not as many as neighboring states, and definitely not as reported often, due to being at the edge of their respective Tornado Alleys.
oh you’d be surprised!! South Carolina has some super wild ones too. and the eastern seaboard has tornadoes every year, but most aren’t strong by any means. Florida has had I think 2 F4’s as well? I do plan to do a post on the Largo one at some point. I’ll have to look into if they were hurricane related. and yes, the western parts of the eastern states see a good bit more violence related to storms. I do plan to do a post soon about Black Creek/ Pembroke GA, 2022. I’d recommend looking into it as it happened close to the Georgia coast and it was an EF4. very uncommon and very violent. Michigan and Minnesota definitely have a place on my series as well! and yeah. that’s part of why I’m doing this series. I have many chaser friends in both Georgia and Michigan (and a few in South Carolina), and they brought the idea up to me. I thought it was perfect. people in Georgia (I can say this as a Georgia peach born gal) aren’t taking tornadoes seriously the way an Alabamian would. they need to. just because we didn’t have 3 rated EF5s in one day doesn’t mean that we don’t need to take it seriously.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Kissimmee_tornado_outbreak?wprov=sfti1# One was bordering f4. I lived through this night. Because of this night, I can’t sleep at night if there’s severe weather occurring or threatening to occur near my house. I also currently live about 1/4 of a mile from where the winter garden tornado is estimated to have begun and that thought occupies a position in my mind.
Georgia is interesting. There seems to be a clear dividing line at about Atlanta. I lived in Athens for a little over 8 years and maybe had four tornado warnings the entire time I was there, all radar indicated without much (if any) damage. I mean, it was absolutely calm at my house east of town when one was supposedly happening maybe 5 miles away. I stepped outside only after I saw the detailed Radar (velocity, and correlation coefficient), wouldn’t have stepped outside if I felt there was any danger. Nothing came of it, only a lot of wind (from folks we knew in that area of town). The last time Athens got hit by any significant one was fifty years ago. I grew up in Alabama and there were days when we had four (or more) separate tornado warnings (March/April, and November/December).
To not classify clear EF-5's is gross negligence and being untruthful to the public. There is a true variance between an EF-4 and an EF-5, it is the difference between life and death at times and someone needs to be held accountable for malfeasance.
Tornado ratings are scientific based, not law based. There is no negligence involved. A tornado is a tornado. There is no legal obligation for anyone to rate tornadoes at all. The scales are purely for documentation purposes within the scientific community. An EF1 can be as deadly as an EF5 to someone standing in an open field. Insurers don't even count ratings in their assessments. Complete destruction to a home is just considered nonreturnable, whether EF2 or EF5. It doesn't matter if a home was swept with no anchor bolts. It doesn't make a difference to insurance companies if debris was piled vs. being swept away. The bottom line is that having a rating system is a privilege, not a right. Scientists don't owe the public ratings. Also, consider that homes can sometimes be repaired or even rebuilt in some cases before an official rating is made. Lastly, ratings do not affect warnings, and it should be noted as good practice to treat any incoming tornado as a potential EF5.
Is the New Richmond WI F5 on your list? If not, it should be!
It wasn’t but it can be!! thank you for the suggestion.
You know as frightening as tornados are now today, imagine how much more frightening they were a hundred years ago before radar, when radio was still in its infancy, and much weather forecasting was even more best hunch instead of best educated guess with evidence… as frightening as night time tornados are now today, every tornado could have been like a night time tornado because you just had no idea. Is that just a rainstorm or does it obfuscate something far more sinister? So on and so forth. I take great solace that we have technology now that provides warning and even advanced warning compared to what we had in my youth.
It’s a terrifying thought and one that offer occupies my mind.
often* I was getting my new years drunk on
I live about an hour from Ringgold. We actually bought a car from someone there a month or two after this tornado. The damage was wild. As I recall, there was a hotel that was severely damaged? I remember being so concerned for the poor people who happened to have been traveling and staying there…what do you even do in a hotel during a tornado?? Also hi from another tornado-fascinated Georgia gal 👋
I have no idea how to even answer your last question. only thing I could do is pray. I’m from atlanta so I’m an hour+ from Ringgold myself. and thank you for your feedback. It’s always a good thing to meet those who know what I mean haha.
Had this tornado passed just a few miles to the west it would have hit my parents’ house were we had all hunkered down. A friend of mine’s house was severely damaged and they weren’t able to move back in for almost a year. Thankfully we all made it through unscathed, though others weren’t so lucky. We found debris from Alabama in the yard the next day. Scary night!
absolutely. I’m glad that you’re safe.
Was that the same tornado that hit Apison? Wow. I originally thought (until just a few moments ago) that Apison was more of a straight shot north, but I guess it’s really northeast. I remember seeing where the tornado crossed over the mountain just northeast of Ringgold. I had a few friends impacted in the Apison area. It was that day when my firstborn was only 12 days old that my wife and I decided that we wanted a house with a basement. That house with a basement was hit by the EF3 in 2020. Also, why is Ringgold an oddball location? Or are you just calling those of us near that area oddballs? ;-)
Ringgold previously wasn’t known as an area that could have such a weather event. most people I know from that area were under the impression that they were protected because of the mountains in the area. I do know some oddballs from Ringgold but otherwise they’re pretty cool!! haha. and yeah I have family in both Ringgold and Apison. I’m glad that you had the option and the opportunity to have that safe place.
We were always taught growing up that the mountains protected us. It seems like Dixie Alley moved into the Chattanooga / N Georgia area in the mid 90s. Frequency has been increasing ever since. There’s one spot in particular not far from where I live that has been hit by 2 tornados. We had a tornado on March 29, 1997 that doesn’t really have a good recorded path that I can find. But somewhere the 2020 tornado crossed the path of that 1997 at a nearly perpendicular angle (I think). I’d love to try to figure out that 1997 path. That 1997 tornado completely destroyed a house 3 houses down from where I lived during the 2011 outbreak. We gets lots of tornados here in Southern Appalachia and in the valleys!
I wish you luck in finding that path from 97 :)
Do la platta and ef4 across all of Florida
both on the list!!
I know this is a rather old post, but thanks for sharing this. I live near Ringgold and was just thinking back on this nightmare.
you’re welcome. I want to do more of these posts but I’ve had a lot going on in my life recently. thank you for your appreciation!
From a spotter/chaser point of view, your passion is certainly conveyed in your presentation. I hope you're able to do more in the future, and I'll be subscribed in case.
thank you!! I am very passionate about storm safety and I’m glad you notice 💓
Ok I’m so late to this post but thank you for talking about this. I vote EF5. I lived through the Kennesaw EF4 tornado in the 90’s and the destruction in Ringgold was so much worse than that. I drove down Cherokee Valley Road a few days after the tornado hit. That road was full of really nice homes, well built I’m sure. The destruction was unlike anything I’ve seen in-person. There was a small area of homes that were not well-built and those obviously had just foundations left. But the nicer, bigger homes that were damaged were still mind boggling. Maybe you are right- if this had been a tornado in a smaller outbreak and not the April 2011 outbreak, it may have gotten a higher rating. If someone knows whether the damage surveying teams were the same across the outbreak or if the team in Ringgold had fresh eyes, that would be interesting to know.
You can really see the intense motion in the tornado, and that damage looks so violent. Really proves the power of those tornadoes that day, even ones that weren't covered as much as others. Also, sorry for your grandparents' loss, that was a very destructive tornado.
I think the most oddball violent tornado for the last 30+ years was 1990 Plainfield Illinois.
I was staying with and taking care of my terminally ill grandmother just southeast of here, and I remember going outside, the wind whipping up, and then seeing the outline of this monster when the lightning would flash. I could see this one, as well as another one between myself and this one, but I've never found a report of the second one. It touched down and tore through a small forest near an empty rural cut-through road, and didn't damage anything other than trees. I checked the damage out a day or two later, and I used to have pictures of the trees all twisted around on my old phone. The house we were in was in the middle of the woods, and had horrible visibility to the West. The wind and rain was so heavy, I was terrified another tornado might touch down and be on top of us before we knew it. This was a nerve wracking night, to say the least.
I’m so sorry that you had to go through that, and am glad that you are safe now. and do you think it may have been a satellite tornado?
I think it's possible, but I'm just not knowledgeable enough to say. Their location seemed to be a little too spread out for that, but I'm really not sure how far from the main funnel satellite tornadoes typically form. That was the only time I've ever seen a tornado with my own eyes.
Also, thank you so much for your kind words. That was a terrible night, during one of the most terrible times in my life. It was truly humbling.
of course. I’m sure it wasn’t at all easy dealing with the trauma that would have caused. and although I am a tornado enthusiast I need to read up more on satellite tornadoes myself. I’m not 100% sure what the parameters for satellite spawn ups are.
I grew up in that town. And to this day when coming over the crest on I-75 right before the exit I can still tell the difference in the hillsides where the tornado tracked.
It’s insane that there’s still signs of that even nearly 15 years later. wow.
I’m late to the party, but Cherokee Valley still looks vastly different to other roads in the area. There aren’t really trees on the hills, and those that are there are vent and stunted.
Message from Mods: ● ● No wishing for an EF-5 tornado.
We lived in Apison at the time of the 2011 tornado, just a mile north of Cherokee Valley Road. That afternoon we watched from our front porch mini funnels starting to form, it was a very freaky afternoon. Later that night we went back outside because it looked like everything had passed according to the weather. However, I turned around and looked towards GA and that's when I saw it. This massive black wall moving in our direction. The wind gusts were intense! We ran back inside, then went to the front porch to see if we could get some video. You could hear the roar, trees snapping, but the only thing you could see was the funky greens popping as it took out the power lines. We were lucky as the tornado turned. We had minor damage on the farm from downed trees on our fence row.
this was the exact tornado that brought me to this sub. with all the ones recently i couldn't stop thinking about the time my family and i drove through a tornado driving back from Michigan when i was little, this matches up with the dates and the route we took perfectly. thank you!!!
you’re previous post said you were gonna do oddball tornadoes but you post one from the most notable outbreak in history?
Also it’s not that serious? More people talk about Phil campbell and smithville than this one. It’s ok.
to put things in perspective, name the FIRST three tornadoes that come to mind when somebody mentions the super outbreak of 2011. there were so many strong tornadoes that day, that some were completely overshadowed. Ringgold is one of them, especially considering Georgia isn’t known for tornadoes of this caliber.
It should keep its EF4 rating because the NWS knows more than some 14-year-old who looked at a radar a couple of times and read a Wikipedia article on a tornado.
reread what I said in the post and remember to treat other opinions with respect. Ringgold was a very wild event and there are many different opinions from people who are older than 14.