During the early morning hours of Sunday, February 16, 2003, a squall line swept across the NWS WFO Tallahassee County Warning and Forecast Area. The office issued a total of nine warnings. These included four tornado, one severe thunderstorm, and four special marine warnings. Fortunately, there were no fatalities associated with this event, despite the early hour on a weekend morning. The following is a brief discussion of the severe weather that occurred that morning. A reflectivity loop from the KTLH radar for the portion of the event described below is available as Figure 1. This is a large file (1.5 MB) and may take a while to load.

The first Special Marine Warning (SMW) was issued at 0740 UTC (1:40 am CST) for a large cluster of storms out in the Gulf well south of the Panhandle that exhibited strong mesocyclones and frequent intense lightning. By 0948 UTC (3:48 am CST), another SMW was necessary, as the strong storms has moved much closer to shore. This warning stated that one of the strongest storms would move ashore into Tyndall Air Force Base by 1015 UTC (4:15 am CST) and that coastal residents should be alert for the possibility of waterspouts moving ashore. One did just that, tossing about several vehicles on the base around 1000 UTC (4:00 am CST). Another suspected waterspout-turned-tornado blew into Port St. Joe in Gulf County a short time later and damaged a carport, as well as several roofs and porches. Around 1010 UTC (4:10 am CST), another storm exibited strong gate-to-gate rotational velocity and a tornado warning was promptly issued at 1017 UTC (4:17 am CST) for Washington County in the Eastern Florida Panhandle. The warning was valid for about a half hour and stated that the tornado would be near Vernon around 1030 UTC. At precisely that time, the local 911 operator for the county reported that windows were blown out of, and shingles blown off, her sister's home in Vernon, with a neighboring house sustaining some damage as well. The tornadic storm continued on into a rural parts of Jackson County Florida, but no additional damage reports were received. The coastal storms weakened as they moved inland into the western Florida Big Bend. However, additional SMWs were necessary as the strong storms marched eastward across the Apalachee Bay between about 1200 and 1500 UTC (7:00-10:00 am EST).

Around 1220 UTC (7:20 am EST), a storm in Gadsden County, FL, began to rotate and the KTLH Doppler radar began to indicate a persistent mesocyclone. The storms then crossed the border into Decatur County, GA. Calls to EM and 911 officials in these counties confirmed our suspicions that the circulation had not lowered to the ground. However, by the time the storm reached northern Grady County, it had taken on a classic bookend vortex signature. A tornado warning was issued at 1309 UTC (8:09 am EST) for northern Grady County and upstream Mitchell County, GA, near the sites of the deadly F3 tornadoes that swept the area in February 2000. The warning was valid until 1345 UTC (8:45 am) and stated the tornado would be near Pelham by around 1325 UTC (8:25 am EST). Figure 2 (below) shows the bookend vortex as it moved northeastward across southern Mitchell County at that time. Click the image for a larger view.

Georgia Emergency Management NWS investigators later determined that a tornado touched down in the northernmost portion of Grady County, just south of County Line Rd, and then traveled northeast into Mitchell County as an F1 tornado. The damage path of the Grady/Mitchell County tornado, a schematic of the debris field, and its intensity based on the Fujita scale can be found in Figure 3. As can be seen, several mobile homes were damaged or destroyed. A couple of permanent homes also sustained structural damage, and many trees were felled in the area. Several photos of the debris field have been provided courtesy of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency. The vortex sucked the grass right out of the ground as it skipped across extreme northern Grady County (Photo 1). The tornado then tracked across Wade Rd. and Highway 262. The most extensive damage occurred on or near the Harper property on Wade Rd. Mr. Harper read the warning as it scrawled across the screen on WALB-TV out of Albany, GA. He alerted his wife and they decided to leave the home for a low, protected area on their property. Unable to escape the approaching tornado, they dove beside their parked automobile., located just a few yards from their mobile home. The car shifted a few feet briefly pinning Mrs. Harper underneath. She escaped with bruises. Photo 2 shows what was left of their trailer after the tornado passed. Although they suffered the great loss of their property, timely warnings and rapid dissemination by the local television station likely saved their lives.