Memphis, TN Tornado History — 106 Tornadoes Since 1950
How many tornadoes has Memphis, TN had?
Memphis has had 106 tornadoes on record within 25 miles since 1950, including 12 violent (EF3+) tornadoes.
When was the most recent tornado near Memphis?
The most recent tornado within 25 miles of Memphis was an EF1 on May 18, 2025.
When is tornado season in Memphis?
April is historically the peak month for tornadoes near Memphis, with 23 on record. Spring through early summer (April–June) generally sees the highest activity across most of the central and southern United States.
At a Glance
Recent Tornado Activity Near Memphis
The last 20 years of confirmed tornadoes within 25 miles — 25 total, averaging 1.3 per year over this window.
Tornadoes by Decade
Tornadoes by Enhanced Fujita Rating
F0–F5 ratings (pre-2007) are grouped with their EF equivalents. The Enhanced Fujita scale replaced the original Fujita scale in February 2007.
Tornadoes by Month
Casualties on Record Near Memphis
25 fatalities have been recorded within 25 miles of Memphis since 1950, across 10 events. 460 injuries have been reported across all events. 1987 was the deadliest year on record.
The deadliest single event was a F3 on December 14, 1987, which caused 6 fatalities along a 25.0-mile track.
Notable Tornadoes Near Memphis
About Tornadoes in Memphis
This overview was written April 23, 2026. The tornado counts and notable-event figures elsewhere on this page reflect the latest data and may differ from this summary.
Memphis sits in the heart of Dixie Alley — the Mid-South tornado belt that, by most modern measures, has overtaken the central Plains as the deadliest US tornado region per capita. Memphis tornado risk has the textbook Dixie Alley signature: high frequency, frequent nocturnal events, dense tree cover that makes tornadoes hard to see, two distinct seasonal peaks (spring and late fall), and a metro housing stock that includes a meaningful share of mobile homes and older structures with no basement.
The April 2, 2006 Mid-South outbreak
The defining event in modern Memphis-metro tornado history is the April 2, 2006 outbreak, which produced multiple long-track tornadoes across western Tennessee, eastern Arkansas, and northwest Mississippi on a single afternoon. The F3 Dyer County, TN tornado killed 24 people across the Bradford and Newbern areas; smaller F2 and F1 tornadoes affected the broader Memphis suburbs in Shelby, Tipton, and DeSoto counties. The April 2006 outbreak occurred during a Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) tornado watch that SPC had issued the day before — a high-end-confidence forecast that did not prevent the fatality count but did move the entire region into a heightened response posture.
The Super Tuesday 2008 outbreak
The February 5, 2008 Super Tuesday outbreak — named because it occurred during the Super Tuesday primary elections — produced tornadoes across Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Kentucky during a single afternoon and overnight cycle. Memphis-area damage was concentrated in northern DeSoto County, MS (immediately south of the Tennessee state line) where an EF3 tornado tracked through Olive Branch and Walls. The Super Tuesday event killed 57 people across the broader Mid-South and is one of the deadliest single-day tornado outbreaks of the 21st century.
The March 2020 Tennessee outbreak
The March 2-3, 2020 outbreak produced the EF4 Cookeville tornado that killed 19 people in the Putnam County, TN area. Cookeville is roughly 200 miles east of Memphis, but the same severe-weather setup affected the entire Tennessee corridor and produced multiple tornadoes across the Mid-South including significant Memphis-suburb impacts. The March 2020 event occurred almost entirely overnight (most fatalities happened between 1 AM and 4 AM CST), reinforcing the Dixie Alley nocturnal-tornado pattern that drives the region's elevated mortality.
Tornadoes by part of the metro
Memphis-metro tornado risk distributes across three states. Shelby County, TN (Memphis proper plus inner suburbs Bartlett, Germantown, Collierville) has had multiple EF2+ tornadoes in modern record. DeSoto County, MS (Olive Branch, Southaven, Horn Lake) is the most-hit immediate suburb, partly because storm motion typically brings supercells in from the southwest across northwest Mississippi. Tipton and Fayette counties on the Tennessee/Memphis northern fringe see less but have produced violent tornadoes including the 2006 Dyer County path's southern extent. Crittenden County, AR (West Memphis) has a long record of strong tornadoes.
What this means for Memphis residents today
Memphis-metro housing stock is mixed. Older Midtown and East Memphis homes typically have basements (atypical for the broader Mid-South), but Cordova, Bartlett, and the DeSoto County suburbs are dominated by slab-on-grade construction without basements. Mobile-home parks are concentrated in outer suburbs and rural unincorporated areas — those residents face the highest tornado fatality risk in the region.
For nighttime alerting — the dominant Dixie Alley risk window — phone-call alerts that bypass Do Not Disturb are the highest-leverage protective layer for Memphis-area residents. The 2008 Super Tuesday and 2020 March outbreaks both occurred substantially overnight; the residents who survived without shelter were overwhelmingly the ones who got woken up by an alert. NWS Memphis (MEG) handles the western Tennessee, eastern Arkansas, and northwest Mississippi area and issues warnings with consistently long lead times for the metro.