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1Most severe tornado damage; see Fujita scale 2Time from first tornado to last tornado
The Carolinas tornado outbreak of March 28, 1984, was the most destructive tornado outbreak to sweep through the two states since another tornado outbreak struck 100 years and 1 month earlier, according to NOAA and NCDC public records.
Summary
On the evening of March 27, upper-air plots identified a broad and powerful upper-level trough exiting the southern Rocky Mountains into the Great Plains.[1] Winds in the upper reaches of the troposphere accelerated upwards of 140 kn (160 mph; 260 km/h) across Texas and Mississippi. In the mid-levels of the atmosphere, the trough detached into a cut-off low, while a potent shortwave trough rounded the base of this feature into the Gulf Coast of the United States. Winds at this level increased to 95 kn (110 mph; 175 km/h), and notably, became increasingly diffluent across the Southeastern United States.[2] Early on March 28, a surface area of low pressure developed over eastern Texas and reached a minimum barometric pressure of 987 mb (29.1 inHg) as it pushed into western Tennessee later that day.[3] Winds in the lower levels of the atmosphere intensified to 50–60 kn (60–70 mph; 95–110 km/h) and likewise increased at the surface,[2] contributing to significant warm air advection to the south of a warm front draped across the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina. By 15:00 UTC, surface dewpoints had surged in excess of 60 °F (16 °C) across Georgia and South Carolina, at which time forecasters at the National Weather Service Severe Local Storms Unit (SLSU) – equivalent to the modern-day Storm Prediction Center – outlined a Moderate risk of severe weather from southwestern Georgia northeastward into southern Maryland. Within three hours, these moist dewpoints surged well into eastern North Carolina as the surface low pushed into southern Kentucky.[3]
To the south of the original area of low pressure, a distinct mesolow developed along the warm front across northern Alabama. This feature first began to form around 18:00 UTC, and within three hours, it had rapidly deepened to a barometric pressure of 976 mb (28.82 inHg). This system moved rapidly northeast at speeds up to 55 kn (65 mph; 100 km/h), thus crossing into eastern North Carolina during the evening hours.[2] As it did so, low-level winds across the eastern Carolinas originated from a southerly direction instead of a southwesterly direction; this shift in flow created a strongly sheared environment across the region. Meanwhile, afternoon temperatures climbed above 80 °F (27 °C), contributing to significant destabilization. Convective available potential energy values rose between 2,000 and 3,000 J/kg into North Carolina,[1] with locally higher values observed in northeastern South Carolina.[2]
These environmental conditions bore strong resemblance to the idealized tornado setup across the Carolinas, and they prompted the SLSU to upgrade areas from eastern Alabama into the Outer Banks of North Carolina to a High risk of severe weather,[3] the first occurrence on record in this portion of the United States.[1] As the mesolow moved across the Carolinas, it was supported by a surface trough to its east-northeast which likely formed as a result of differential heating.[3] Strong low-level convergence associated with this feature led to vigorous thunderstorm development in close proximity to the low,[1] where low-level helicity was maximized and highly supportive of supercell thunderstorms.[2] These supercells first began producing tornadoes across Upstate South Carolina around 19:15 UTC and continued to do so as they moved northeast, passing between Columbia and Charlotte around 22:00 UTC, near Fayetteville around 00:00 UTC on March 29, and finally ending north of the Albemarle Sound in northeastern North Carolina around 02:00 UTC.[1][3] In total, 24 tornadoes were confirmed, with 11 each in the Carolinas and 2 in Georgia. The size and scope of the event drew parallels to the 1884 Enigma tornado outbreak and tornado outbreak on April 16, 2011, and it held the record for number of tornadoes in the Carolinas until that 2011 event.[1] Comparisons were also drawn to the 1925 Tri-State tornado outbreak given the progression of an intense collection of tornadoes located near the mesolow.[2]
Hundreds of trees were downed. Thirty chicken houses, a manufactured home, a golf course, and more than one hundred buildings sustained minor roof damage. A child in the manufactured home sustained minor injuries.[4][5]
An F1 tornado tracked to the northeast of Ware Shoals. It was embedded within a larger area of downburst winds that also moved across Anderson and Abbeville counties. In the latter, more than 18 homes were damaged or destroyed and 24 people were injured.[5][7]
A large and significant tornado destroyed 19 manufactured homes and damaged another 13 others. It also damaged or destroyed 5 community buildings and 500 acres (200 ha) of timber. A total of 43 people were injured.[5][8]
1 death – A large F2 tornado moved northeast through downtown Newberry, which reportedly resembled a "war zone" after the tornado struck. It damaged or destroyed 80 businesses, including a church lost its roof and a wall, as well as a dance academy building that partially collapsed. The fatality occurred when an automotive shop was destroyed. An additional 38 people were injured.[5][9][10]
A large and intense tornado began near New Hope and continued eastward into Fairfield County. This tornado and the previous one collectively destroyed 254 houses, 86 businesses, 68 farm buildings, 45 manufactured homes, and 7 large public buildings. This second tornado injured 10 people.[5][11][12]
6 deaths – F4 tornado moved east through the northern edge of Winnsboro before crossing Interstate 77, parallel to the previous tornado along much of its path. A private school was severely damaged, where witnesses reported buses thrown into the air. A church and several masonry retail buildings collapsed as well. In total, the violent tornado damaged or destroyed 40 houses, 24 manufactured homes, 5 communities, and 4 businesses. It killed 6 people, of which 5 were in mobile homes and 1 died from a heart attack, and injured 49 others. Strong downburst winds accompanied this tornado and three subsequent ones.[5][9][13]: 647–648 [14]
Another violent tornado damaged several buildings, caused extensive tree damage, and injured five people in Lancaster County. It crossed into Kershaw County, demolishing a manufactured home park and injuring 31 more people.[5][16][17]
A strong tornado moved through a pine forest. It was accompanied by strong downburst winds that caused considerable damage southeast of Kershaw in Kershaw County to west of Patrick in Chesterfield County.[5][18]
7 deaths – A violent tornado moved through the north side of Bennettsville before dissipating near Laurinburg. It killed three people in the rural community of Lester and four others in Fletcher before crossing the state line. In total, 100 people were injured.[5][20][21]
5 deaths – Another F4 tornado touched down near Bennettsville. To the east, the tornado devastated the towns of Tatum and McColl. The tornado crossed the state line and struck the towns of Johns and Maxton before obliterating Red Springs. The tornado dissipated near Parkton, after injuring 395 people.[5][22][23][24][25][26]
12 deaths – Tornado first struck Beaver Dam, killing two and leveling a large swath of pine forest. The tornado then struck Salemburg, killing one person there before killing two others near Roseboro. Six people were killed in the Clinton area before the tornado dissipated. The tornado injured 101 people.[5][27][28][29]
3 deaths – A violent tornado began northeast of Clinton, killing one person in central Sampson County. It continued into Duplin County, causing severe damage to Faison and Calypso. In Wayne County, another two people died in Mount Olive. Otherwise, 149 people were injured.[5][31][32][33]
16 deaths – This violent tornado was the deadliest of the outbreak, causing fatalities and major damage in and around Snow Hill, Winterville, Ayden, and Greenville. In total, 153 people were injured.[5][36][37][38][39]
6 deaths – An intense tornado moved near Lewiston, demolishing a manufactured home park and killing six people; five deaths originated from the same family. Nineteen people were also injured.[5][40]
An intense tornado crossed the South Carolina–North Carolina line, destroying two manufactured homes and damaging another house. It also inflicted considerable damage to utilities and injured eight people.[5][44][45]
1 death – The last tornado of the outbreak touched down as a waterspout over the Albemarle Sound before moving onshore. A tree was blown over, crushing a manufactured home and resulting in one fatality and an injury.[5][47][48]
Ultimately this outbreak was responsible for 57 deaths, 1,249 injuries, and confirmed tornado damage in 2 counties in Georgia, 8 counties in South Carolina, and 17 counties in North Carolina, according to data from the National Weather Service and the National Climatic Data Center records and statistical data.
This was an unusual East Coast outbreak both in its sustained intensity and in some of its meteorological specifics. It was noted by Grazulis and other researchers[13]: 648 that this outbreak developed near the center of a large-scale low, in a fashion resembling the 1925 Tri-State tornado. In this outbreak, the damage path was attributed to separate tornadoes, though one storm produced (on an estimated 250+ mile track) a family of 13 large tornadoes, 10 of which produced F3 or F4 damage, which was occasionally connected by swaths of downburst damage. The resulting tornado family, the series of tornadoes in totality is among the longest on record.[49]
This outbreak was also part of a larger storm system that was responsible for producing severe weather across a much wider area of the eastern U.S. On the previous day, weaker tornadoes had been reported in scattered locations from Louisiana to Alabama, and a thunderstorm-caused flash flood was suspected to be the cause of a train derailment in north Florida. The northern part of the same system first spawned additional severe (non-tornadic) thunderstorms, which caused 4 additional deaths in Maryland and Pennsylvania, before then dropping snow, sleet and ice across a wide area of the northeast. The thunderstorms which produced the tornado outbreak were also responsible (according to the same data) for numerous reports of large hail and wind damage in Appalachian southwest North Carolina, and numerous larger cities (Atlanta, Baltimore, Greenville, South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, Charlotte, North Carolina, Dover, Delaware, Fayetteville, North Carolina, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Raleigh, North Carolina, Suffolk, Virginia, Norfolk, Virginia) at the periphery of the outbreak, with wind damage from thunderstorms reported as far north as Delaware.
^ abcdePhillip Badgett; Barrett Smith; Jonathan Blaes; Rod Gonski; Kermit Keeter (March 18, 2009). March 28, 1984 Carolina's Tornado Outbreak (Report). North Carolina State University. Retrieved April 2, 2022.
^ abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxStorm Data(PDF) (Report). Vol. 26. National Centers for Environmental Information. March 1984. Archived from the original(PDF) on April 4, 2022. Retrieved April 3, 2022.
Grazulis, Thomas P. (2001). The Tornado. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 203.
Fujita, T. T.; Stiegler, D. (1985). "Detailed analysis of the tornado outbreak in the Carolinas by using radar, satellite, and aerial survey data. Preprints". 14th Conference on Severe Local Storms, Indianapolis. American Meteorological Society. pp. 271–274.
Kraft, Scott; Harper, Timothy (April 1, 1984). "Wreckage, victims tell tornado's tale on 450-mile route". Herald-American (Syracuse, New York). Associated Press. p. 16.
