Tornado outbreak of September 24, 2001

The Tornado outbreak of September 24, 2001 was the most dramatic recent tornado event to directly affect the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area in the United States. The outbreak occurred on Monday, September 24, 2001, and was responsible for two deaths and 57 injuries.

The first tornado of the outbreak was also the strongest – an F4 (see Fujita scale) tornado that left a 10-mile-long damage path through rural Culpeper and Fauquier Counties in Virginia. Weak (F1) tornadoes east of Warrenton, and just west of Dulles International Airport soon followed.

A second supercell to the southeast spawned the family of tornadoes that moved through Washington. A first tornado (F0) was confirmed in the Quantico, and nearby Prince William Forest Park areas; this was soon followed by an F1 tornado that left a 15-mile-long path parallel to I-95 and I-395 through Franconia, western Alexandria, and southeastern Arlington. This tornado dissipated near the west end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and was followed by many reports of funnel clouds. The storm affected workers at the Pentagon who were mending the damage from the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The same storm soon produced a powerful, multiple-vortex F3 tornado in College Park, Maryland. This storm moved at peak intensity through the University of Maryland, College Park campus, and then moved parallel to I-95 through the Beltsville, Maryland, area, where the tornado caused extensive damage to greenhouses and other facilities of the USDA Beltsville Agricultural Research Center. The storm continued on to Laurel, Maryland, where F3 damage was also noted. The damage path from this storm was measured at 17.5 miles in length, and this tornado caused two deaths and 55 injuries, along with $101 million in property damage.

The two deaths at College Park were Colleen and Erin Marlatt, who died when their car was picked up by the tornado near the Easton Hall dormitory and thrown into a tree in a parking area.