This tornado began in the southeast corner of Edmonson County after the Bowling Green EF3tornado dissipated and moved northeast along I-65 into Barren County and Hart County, first passing directly through Park City, where many trees were snapped, barns and outbuildings were destroyed, and homes sustained roof damage. Under the storm and closer to where most tornadoes are found, evidence of a supercell and the likelihood of a tornado includes inflow bands (particularly when curved) such as a "beaver tail", and other clues such as strength of inflow, warmth and moistness of inflow air, how outflow- or inflow-dominant a storm appears, and how far is the front flank precipitation core from the wall cloud. S. National Weather Service (NWS) increased its efforts to train storm spotters so they could spot key features of storms that indicate severe hail, damaging winds, and tornadoes, as well as storm damage and flash flooding. When severe weather is anticipated, local weather service offices request these spotters to look out for severe weather and report any tornadoes immediately, so that the office can warn of the hazard.

Other videos showed flash flooding in parts of the borough, with torrents of water running down streets. Also under study are the low-level mesocyclone and the stretching of low-level vorticity which tightens into a tornado, [87] in particular, what are the processes and what is the relationship of the environment and the convective storm. The event developed as a trough progressed eastward across the United States, interacting with an unseasonably moist and unstable environment across the Mississippi Valley. A large portion of these tornadoes form in an area of the central United States known as Tornado Alley. Tornadoes have been known to cross major rivers, climb mountains, [130] affect valleys, and have damaged several city centers.For a vortex to be classified as a tornado, it must be in contact with both the ground and the cloud base. A grain bin was destroyed, several storage tanks were overturned, approximately 15 power poles were snapped or damaged, and trees were downed.

The parent supercell that produced the two EF4 tornadoes, and eleven tornadoes in total, later became known as the "Quad-State supercell". Reasons for this include the region's high population density, poor construction quality, and lack of tornado safety knowledge. Many large trees were snapped or uprooted throughout the town, and an RV camper was overturned as well. When a warning is issued, going to a basement or an interior first-floor room of a sturdy building greatly increases chances of survival. Sarah Horton, a site investigator from Torro, said she could tell it was a tornado "because of its long narrow track, because debris has been lifted up and carried some distance and its direction of movement shows it was tornadic".Rising air within the updraft tilts the rotating air from horizontal to vertical, and most tornadoes form within this area of strong rotation. The safest place is the side or corner of an underground room opposite the tornado's direction of approach (usually the northeast corner), or the central-most room on the lowest floor. It crossed the Missouri Bootheel, causing additional damage and fatalities near Braggadocio and Hayti. A house sustained roof damage, a couple of metal buildings were heavily damaged or destroyed, and some metal power poles were bent.

Continuing northeast along KY 79, the tornado caused considerable damage in Chandlers Chapel, where a Methodist church lost its steeple and had several broken stained-glass windows, a school building sustained roof and window damage, and homes sustained partial to total roof loss.But rarely are they anything like the destructive columns of wind that can often sweep across America’s ‘Tornado Alley’. That can create an instability in the atmosphere, which coupled with a change in wind direction and an increase in wind speed creates an invisible, horizontal spinning effect in the lower atmosphere. During the second, more intense tornado, peak gate-to-gate velocities of 128mph (206km/h; 111kn) were recorded at 9:58p.