Yazoo City Hit Again by Another Tornado
UPDATE: The NWS has confirmed that an EF-2 tornado hit Yazoo City at Eagle Bend Road, which, as shown below, is very close to the path of the April tornado, if not within it. They say "EF2 TORNADO TRACKED SOUTHWEST OF YAZOO CITY ALONG EAGLE BEND ROAD. PRELIMINARY MAXIMUM WINDS ARE 125 MPH. TIME AND EXACT LOCATION ARE APPROXIMATE." More information from them on the downtown Yazoo City area, and I'm sure damage photos and maps, will be forthcoming. Additional tornadoes have been confirmed in the eastern part of the state.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE: Last night on Facebook I posted an image that I hoped I wouldn't have to: Another Tornado Warning for Yazoo City, Mississippi, the town that was devastated by the EF-4 tornado in April of this year. After damage was reported,my first thought was: How close was the track of this damage to the original tornado? Turns out (based on initial government storm spotter reports) pretty close. Here's a map overlaying the Tornado Warning and Reports from the April 24th storm (pink & red) vs. last night (blue & yellow):
Zooming in and comparing the April tornado track vs. the Tornado Reports (because sometimes they are issued by the lat/lon of the town center, not the specific area where it happened), it's even more incredible... the roads where damage were reported are highlighted as blue clouds while the track of the April tornado is shown in red.
Although last night's storm appears to be oriented a little west of April's track, this time over the downtown area (encircled in green), it's absolutely remarkable that a second tornado (if confirmed by the NWS) could have passed over the same streets seven months later.
You can view a video of the damage on WLBT's website. For more on how rare it is to see a tornado hit the same place twice, check out our news story. Here at AccuWeather.com, our hearts go out to the people in this city, but fortunately no injuries have been reported.
All of this said, we can't be sure it was a tornado until the NWS does their storm survey. There were 47 Tornado Warnings issued last night across the state, but only a handful of tornado reports. Most of the warnings will end up to be false alarms (but better safe than sorry). A NWS employee was quoted in the article linked above, as saying he believed it was a tornado, based on the radar signature.
