One year ago, ten tornadoes touched down across a combined 126.6 miles of Tennessee landscape, leaving tens of thousands without power and taking 24 lives.
March tends to be a violent month for severe weather in many states, and in the Southeast, it marks the unofficial beginning of severe weather season. For Tennessee, it is the second-deadliest month for tornadoes with more than 100 deaths since 1950, with only April having more.
On the night of March 2, 2020, a tornado formed 90 miles northeast of Memphis, and it wasn't until the early morning of March 3 that the same thunderstorm that produced the first tornado would finally produce the last one 50 miles west of Knoxville.
The first three tornadoes touched down in West Tennessee between the Mississippi and Tennessee Rivers. They tore through three counties, and one killed an elderly man in a mobile home.
That third tornado continued across the Tennessee River into Humphreys County, causing EF1 damage and blowing down hundreds of trees from the river eastward. Eventually, an EF3 tornado carved a path of destruction right through downtown Nashville with peak winds of 165 miles per hour across 60.3 miles of Middle Tennessee.
Many residents were asleep at the time the tornadoes occurred. Tennessee leads the country as the state with the highest frequency of nocturnal tornadoes, with more than half of all tornadoes in the state occurring at night.
The tornado in Nashville alone did more than 100 million dollars in damage but was not nearly as deadly as the tornado that struck Cookeville.
The deadliest Tennessee tornado since 1952 directly took 18 lives that night, including five children under 13. Nearly 100 people were injured, and some were left in critical condition. This tornado that tore across Putnam County created damage rated EF4 in some areas. Maximum winds were estimated to be 175 mph right in a populated city center.
These tornadoes caused an estimated 1.6 billion dollars of damage across the state, prompting Governor Bill Lee to issue a statement declaring a state of emergency. Nashville and many other school districts closed the day following the severe storms.
Many states that frequently experience severe weather during the spring will be running tornado drills and conducting severe weather preparedness in the days and weeks to come. The National Weather Service and your Spectrum News weather team will put together educational tips and tools to help prepare you before the storms arrive.
Now is the best time to review the plans with your family at home, at school, and work so you know what to do before the next storm strikes.