A tornado tore a path across Tennessee's Franklin and Coffee counties early Tuesday before the storm headed into Grundy County, destroying homes and forcing some polling places to use generators on Election Day.
Meteorologist Kurt Weber at the National Weather Service office in Huntsville, Alabama, said a survey team visited Franklin County in Tennessee on Tuesday.
"We definitely have a tornado and it looks like a fairly long-track one," Weber said of the storm.
Officials at the weather service office in Nashville, which covers Grundy County, said a survey team went to Rutherford County on Tuesday and they expected to send the team to Grundy on Wednesday.
Grundy County Sheriff Clint Shrum said at least two homes near Pelham, Tennessee, were destroyed and a number of others sustained damage from the storm he suspects was a tornado.
Damage from the storm forced the closure of all county schools and several roads near Gruetli-Laager. Roads also were closed in other areas after what he described as "extensive storm damage" across the county.
"We've got a mess," Shrum said Tuesday morning. "The Pelham Valley community has been hit pretty hard. We've actually got a couple of homes destroyed.
"The Cumberland Heights community over in Altamont and some of the Gruetli-Laager community near the Old Swiss Heritage homestead had damage," he said. The old homestead itself, however, escaped harm, Shrum said.
The sheriff said he believed the storm would turn out to be a tornado after National Weather Service officials were able to look at the damage. On a map, the line of damage roughly follows a northeasterly path from Pelham in eastern Grundy County to the Sequatchie County line.
Storm damage closed State Highway 56 from Colony Road to Altamont, along with Colony Road, Shrum said Tuesday morning. The sheriff said 20th Avenue, which intersects Colony Road, was littered with debris, and a few miles to the northeast, State Highway 399 from Stage Coach Road to the Sequatchie County line was closed.
Shrum said Highway 56 from Colony Road to Altamont would remain closed until Wednesday, at least, as Sequachee Valley Electric Cooperative crews worked to repair the power lines alongside the roadway.
No injuries had been reported.
In Bledsoe and Sequatchie counties, high winds tumbled sheds, broke power poles and downed trees.
Bledsoe County Sheriff Jimmy Morris said damage was scattered.
National Weather Service meteorologist Sam Roberts in Morristown, Tennessee, said damage from the Grundy storm extended to Cagle Mountain in Sequatchie County, as well as Bledsoe County.
"They had quite a few trees down" on Cagle Mountain, he said.
After a survey team member visited Bledsoe and Sequatchie Tuesday, officials initially determined that damage in those two counties came from straight-line winds that ranged between 60 and 85 mph.
Despite storm damage and widespread power outages, voting precincts operated as usual. Officials in Bledsoe, Grundy and Sequatchie said some polling places had to use generators, but everything else was business as usual.
Another tornado was confirmed in Jackson County, Alabama, but Jackson County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Rocky Harnen said Tuesday that storm damage there was limited and there were no injuries.
"We had a touchdown around the Aspel community," Harnen said Tuesday. Aspel is about 8 miles southwest of Scottsboro along U.S. Highway 72 as it heads toward Huntsville. "We probably had 10 to 15 houses affected."
Storms also struck across Middle Tennessee and other parts of the South overnight.
Contact staff writer Ben Benton at bbenton@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6569. Follow him on Twitter @BenBenton or at www.facebook.com/benbenton1.
What voters in storm-damaged Bledsoe, Grundy and Sequatchie need to know
Despite storm damage and widespread power outages from possible tornadoes that passed through the region west of Chattanooga overnight, voting precincts in storm-stricken Bledsoe, Grundy and Sequatchie counties are operating as usual. Bledsoe County voters who cast ballots at the Brayton Mountain Community Center precinct on Hendon Road, Graysville, and at the Lusk Community Building on Old State Highway 28, Dunlap, will find their polls open but operating on generators at least for a while today, according to Administrator of Elections Lisa Wheeler. "We are operating on generators," Wheeler said, adding thanks for local EMA and state elections officials. "We've always had a plan and today we got to implement it." Even though Grundy County was split in half by a suspected tornado overnight, all its precincts opened on time, according to deputy administrator Karen Brawley. She said the precincts in the areas of Altamont, Beesheba Springs and Palmer were impacted but are operating with power supplied by generators. "Voters can vote at their usual precincts, just watch for debris on the roads," Brawley said. Only one precinct in Sequatchie County was impacted by the same storm that passed through neighboring Grundy, deputy administrator Vivian Johnson said. The Cagle Mountain Community Center precinct is operating on battery power until electrical service is restored, Johnson said. "It's voting as usual," she said.