Friday, March 16, 2012

The Tornado Chronicles: West Union, OH Tornado of 3-2-12...

A strong tornado struck just to the Northeast of West Union, OH during the late afternoon / early evening hours of Friday, March 2, 2012. The National Weather Service (NWS) survey rated this tornado EF-2 intensity, with maximum winds estimated at 125 mph.

The tornado touched down at approximately 5:33pm EST about 2 miles to the Northeast of West Union, OH and tracked for about 11 miles before lifting approximately 5 miles North/Northeast of Blue Creek, OH.  The maximum width along the damage path was one quarter of a mile.



The numbers on the above track map correspond to the following photos taken by the NWS survey team (click to enlarge for greater detail):

Location 1:

Location 2:

Location 3:

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Location 8:

As you can see, this tornado took place in a very rural area.  Thus far I have been unable to find any photos or videos of the actual tornado itself.  I will update this post if any are uncovered at a later date.

Doppler radar imagery from the Wilmington, OH area site showed a rather broad circulation (white circled area on the image below) just to the North/Northeast of West Union at approximately 5:32pm EST:


...which then tightened up considerably on this image taken at 5:37 pm EST:


This tornado was just one of many associated with the outbreak that took place across the Midwest, Ohio and Tennessee Valley region on Friday, March 2, 2012.  Please see this post for a "Table of Contents" index listing of the other Tornado Chronicles posts associated with the outbreak. 

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