Tornado Observed from the Cleveland County Fair in North Carolina

November 10, 2017

Cleveland County Tornado_19BA4885-9784-4BD0-ABB6-A0CB82596496 (2)

Photographer: Maya Costales 
Summary Authors: Maya Costales; Jim Foster

The photo above shows an ominous looking storm cloud as observed from the Cleveland County Fair in Shelby, North Carolina, during the afternoon of October 8, 2017. An F1 tornado touched down moments after this picture was snapped. Hurricane Nate pushed very warm, humid air into the southeastern U.S. as it moved northward, after making landfall near the Alabama and Mississippi border. Because the wind field associated with Nate was sufficiently strong to cause the moisture-laden air to rotate, a number of spin up twisters were reported. The strongest ones roared across western North and South Carolina, causing damage to several homes, though, thankfully no lives were lost. Note that the most powerful tornadoes result from supercell thunderstorms