Aug. 17 tornado confirmed EF1 rating
DOWNED TREES — Trees were downed by the high winds Tuesday, August 17, including on Lentz Road, Vashti Fire Dept. Road, and also this large tree on NC 90 in Hiddenite. (Photo courtesy Hiddenite Fire Dept.)
Updated Aug. 19, 2021, 2:24 p.m.
The National Weather Service of Greenville-Spartanburg, SC, issued three Tornado Warnings for Alexander County, with confirmed touchdown of one in the eastern area of the county, on Tuesday, August 17. Other than minor power outages and trees blocking roadways on Lentz Road, Vashti Fire Dept. Road, and a tree down next to Taylorsville Savings Bank in Hiddenite, Alexander County officials told The Times there were no structure damage reports.
Just before noon, the first tornado warning was sounded for eastern Alexander County. and northwestern Iredell. The warning was 11:36 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. At 11:36 a.m., a confirmed tornado was located 7 miles east of Taylorsville, or near Stony Point, moving north at 35 mph. Emergency management confirmed the tornado, the NWS alert stated. The NWS extended the warning to 12:45 p.m.
The Weather Service later issued a Tornado Warning for Western Alexander County in and northeastern Caldwell County in from 3:06 until 3:45 p.m. The source of this NWS warning was radar-indicated rotation in the system.
A third warning was issued for 10:44 p.m. to 11:15 p.m. for the northeast corner of Alexander.
Update: NWS personnel indicated on Twitter that after conducting a storm survey in Alexander County on Wednesday, Aug. 18, it was determined an EF-1 tornado occurred southwest of Stony Point, NC on Tuesday.
The tornado began 3 miles south of Scotts, NC, on Aug. 17, and lasted about ten minutes, from 11:15 to 11:25 a.m. Estimated Peak Wind in the tornado was 110 mph. The twister cut a path length of 5.1194 miles with a maximum width of 200 yards. There were no fatalities or injuries in the storm.
NWS storm survey found the path of an EF1 tornado that developed in western Iredell County along Massey Deal Rd, just west of Old Mountain Rd. The tornado tracked north-northwest, crossing Miracle Farm Rd. and Lindsey Farm Rd. before crossing into Alexander County near Smith Farm Rd., south of Stony Point. The tornado appeared to lift near Lentz Rd just west of Highway 64.
Damage was almost entirely limited to uprooted hardwoods and snapped softwoods, with the most significant damage being a stand of pine trees on Waugh Farm Rd that were snapped as high as 20 feet above the ground. A couple of homes did receive very minor structural damage, according to NWS.
NWS Stony Point tornado path map (shown in green, traveled from Massey Deal Rd in Iredell County to the northwest, ending near Lentz Road in Alexander County).
