1953 Flint–Beecher tornado

Flint–Beecher Tornado

F5 tornado
Tornado damage in Beecher, Michigan
Formed	June 8, 1953, 8:30 pm EST (UTC−01:30)
Max rating1	F5 tornado
Damage	$19 million (1953 USD)
Casualties	116 fatalities, 844 injuries
Areas affected	Flint, Michigan, Beecher, Michigan (part of a larger outbreak)
1Most severe tornado damage; see Fujita scale

The 1953 Flint-Beecher Tornado occurred on Monday, June 8, 1953, and ranks as one of the top ten single deadliest tornadoes in United States history. Rated as an F5 on the Fujita Scale, the tornado touched down in Genesee County, Michigan, at 8:30 p.m. (01:30 UTC) and continued on a 27-mile (43 km) path causing 116 fatalities, 844 injuries and an estimated $19 million (1953 USD) in damage. Most of the casualties and damage occurred in the unincorporated community of Beecher, a suburb on the northern edge of the city of Flint, Michigan. The tornado was one of eight tornadoes that touched down the same day in eastern lower Michigan and northwest Ohio. It was also part of the larger Flint–Worcester tornado outbreak of severe weather that began over Nebraska and Iowa, before moving east across the upper Great Lakes states and Ontario, and on to New York and New England causing more deadly tornadoes.

Just prior to the tornado touching down eyewitness accounts recalled that an approaching thunderstorm with several intense lightning strikes turned the northwest sky a dark “black-yellow-green” color. The US Weather Bureau (predecessor of today's National Weather Service) observations that evening recorded a temperature of 78 °F (25.5 °C) with a dew point of 71 °F (21.6 °C) and a barometric pressure reading that fell to 28.89 inHg (inches of mercury) (978.32 mb). Surface map analysis showed a frontal system associated with a strong low pressure moving west across lower Michigan. At 7:30pm (00:30 UTC) the Weather Bureau’s Severe Storms Unit issued a Severe Weather Bulletin alerting of the threat of hazardous weather for southeast lower Michigan.