Southwest Georgia tornado outbreak of 13–14 February 2000: An overview

Beginning Sunday evening, February 13 and continuing into the early morning hours of Monday, February 14, WFO Tallahassee issued 50 warnings. These included 26 tornado, 21 severe thunderstorm, and 3 special marine warnings. During this time, warnings were issued for three deadly tornadoes, which caused the loss of 18 lives in three southwest Georgia Counties, an event unequaled in south Georgia in nearly 50 years.

The Camilla mesocyclone came ashore in extreme southeast Walton County, Florida, at approximately 0145 UTC (8:45pm EST), and maintained its identity for nearly 200 miles across the panhandle of Florida and southwest Georgia. This storm was responsible for extensive damage in northern Bay County at 0200 UTC. It became tornadic at 0442 UTC near Branchville, Georgia, passing just south of Camilla before dissipating around 0500 UTC. This F3 tornado cut an 11-mile path and was responsible for 11 deaths.

The second deadly mesocyclone developed in Seminole County in extreme southwest Georgia at 0500 UTC. This storm rapidly developed as it crossed Decatur County into Grady County. It became tornadic at 0540 UTC approximately 10 miles north of Cairo, and passed along the northern outskirts of Meigs, Georgia. Six people were killed and the damage path was approximately 14 miles. The storm reintensified in extreme northeast Colquitt County, and became tornadic again at 0639 UTC near Omega, Georgia. One death occurred and the damage path was more than 6 miles long.

This paper will concentrate on the environment in which these storms developed, as well as the storms themselves. There will be an assessment of the damage these storms inflicted showing storm and damage tracks and how the damage was evaluated. Office performance, with regard to staffing, internal and external communications, will be reviewed. Finally, the impact of AWIPS and the D2D and WarnGen software on the successful multiple-warning operations will be examined, showing the strengths and a few suggested enhancements in warning situations. This paper is a companion of Turnage et al., which examines the WSR-88D algorithm performance of these storms.