Severe thunderstorms spare Scott County
Kentucky wasn't as lucky, as multiple people were killed in a tornado
Scott County was none the worse for wear after a night of severe thunderstorms largely spared the northern Cumberland Plateau region on Friday. However, towns in southeastern Kentucky familiar to Scott Countians were a different story, after a powerful tornado caused a mass casualty event there.
The towns of Somerset and London were directly hit by the powerful tornado, which occurred around 11 p.m. Friday.
The National Weather Service office in Jackson, Ky. issued its first tornado warning at 10:01 p.m., targeting the towns of Owingsville and Salt Lick near Lexington. No tornado was confirmed from that storm, which later produced a tornado warning in Morehead, Ky.
At 10:30 p.m., the NWS in Jackson issued a tornado warning for Somerset and Burnside. A second tornado warning was issued for those towns at 10:58 p.m. This time, the thunderstorm cell would produce a tornado — and a powerful one. Numerous images were posted to social media of the twister backlit by lightning flashes as it approached southern Somerset.
The tornado made a direct hit in the business district along the U.S. Highway 27 corridor just south of the Somerset Mall, in the vicinity of Light #22.
The same tornadic cell caused extreme damage in London, Ky. when it struck a subdivision in a residential area. At least nine people were killed there. It was not immediately clear whether the tornado was the same tornado that struck Somerset, or a separate tornado spawned by the same thunderstorm. The NWS had by that time upgraded the tornado warning to a “Particularly Dangerous Situation,” or PDS, calling it a “life-threatening situation.” The storm cell continued to generate tornado warnings until it neared the small town of Hazard, Ky. at nearly 1 a.m.
Meanwhile, a third tornado warning was issued for the Somerset area for a separate storm cell that passed just south of the town. Social media was flooded with erroneous reports that three tornadoes had directly hit Somerset, likely due to the fact that three separate tornado warnings were issued for the city. In fact, there was a tornado confirmed with only one tornadic storm cell, though NWS storm survey teams may ultimately determine that the storm cell produced multiple tornadoes if the twister dissipated at any point along its route.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said Saturday morning that at least 14 people had been killed in the storms, though there was no immediate indication how many of those fatalities occurred in Somerset. The Lexington Herald-Leader newspaper quoted a spokesperson for the Laurel County Sheriff’s Office, where the town of London is located, as saying that nine people had been killed there.
Back in Tennessee, the NWS office in Morristown issued a severe thunderstorm warning for most of Scott County and northern Morgan County at 12:58 a.m. — exactly two hours after the fateful tornado warning was sounded for Somerset. The NWS later issued second and third severe thunderstorm warnings for the same line of storms that included parts of Scott County.
However, the thunderstorms caused very little damage locally, except for a few downed trees and sporadic power outages. The largest power outage was reported in the Annadale and Capital Hill areas east of Huntsville. Later, power went out briefly in all of West Oneida, but it was unclear whether that outage was storm-related.
After a calm weekend, rain is expected to become likely again Monday and continue through much of the week. The Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla. has already included much of Tennessee and Kentucky — including the northern Cumberland Plateau region — in a severe weather risk outlook for Tuesday.