This Day in History -- Springfield, Mass., Tornado | WeatherBug
Main Menu
Responsive menu icon

This Day in History -- Springfield, Mass., Tornado

May 21, 2020
By WeatherBug Meteorologist, Andrew Rosenthal
Today marks the ninth anniversary of a tornado that wreaked havoc in an unusual location: western Massachusetts. The twister’s path changed the face of the region’s largest city, Springfield, setting the stage for a rebirth.
 
The first day of June 2011 was a typical late-spring day, with warm and humid air piling up across New England. Following a line of benign storms that marched across southern New England that morning, temperatures surged well into the 80s, fueling the atmosphere for thunderstorms.
 
Two other ingredients led to an outbreak of tornadoes: a cold front providing a trigger for storm development, and plenty of spin as storms pushed east from the nearby Berkshire Mountains. The first signs of trouble occurred around 2 p.m. in upstate New York and southern Vermont, where storms produced 60 mph wind gusts and hail to the size of baseballs.
 
Shortly before 4:30 p.m., a tornado developed about 5 miles west of the Connecticut River in Westfield, Mass., quickly growing to a behemoth as it tracked toward Springfield, a city of 153,000 on the river’s eastern banks. The storm then ripped across the Connecticut River, taking direct aim at the city’s downtown core.
 
Springfield’s River Walk Park was nearly destroyed by the tornado, as was the city’s Cathedral High School. Widespread damage was reported in the historic Court Square and South End neighborhoods, with the storm ripping apart centuries-old houses and trees. Even after laying waste to the urban core, the tornado continued its march into the eastern suburbs, destroying homes, trees and trailers in Brimfield as it expanded to a half-mile width. More than an hour after touching down, the twister finally dissipated in Charlton, nearly 40 miles from where it had started.
 
Damage from the tornado rated it as an EF-3, the middle rating on the Enhanced Fujita scale, with estimates of the storm’s cost near $140 million. The human toll was even worse, with three fatalities, more than 300 injuries and several hundred left homeless. One woman died protecting her daughter as the family home was flattened by the storm.
 
The tornado was the first deadly twister to strike the Bay State in 16 years, when an F-4 storm killed 3 people in Great Barrington, Mass. While tornadoes are not that rare for southern New England – Massachusetts averages nearly two-and-a-half twisters per year – strong and deadly storms are far more of a rarity. On average, a tornado of this size strikes the state every 15 to 20 years, far less often than the one- to two- years frequency seen in comparably-sized parts of the Plains.
 
In some ways, the storm was a blessing in disguise for Springfield. Forced to redevelop the downtown core and nearby park land, a casino was approved in 2012 and opened in 2018, providing a lynchpin for the city’s tourism industry. A brand-new shuttle bus route now serves the downtown to the Riverwalk and the Basketball Hall of Fame, connecting the two visitor-heavy but previously divided areas of the city.
 
Sources: MassLive.com, weather.gov, National Climatic Data Center
 
Story Image: A shot of the tornado as it moved through Springfield (Matt Putzel, Creative Commons)