Two tornadoes tear through Mississippi in perfectly parallel orbits during deadly ‘superstorm’ — Earth seen from space

This impressive satellite image shows two nearly perfectly parallel tornado tracks in Mississippi carved into the ground after the deadly storm system spawned more than 100 twisters across the United States in early 2025.

From March 14th to 16th, a series of extreme thunderstorms occurred across the Highlands and Midwest due to an “extended upper-level trough” of warm, humid air. The storm system spawned 113 tornadoes in 14 U.S. states, according to the Weather Channel. At least 42 people are believed to have died, according to NBC News.

One of the hardest hit states was Mississippi, with 18 tornadoes. Half of them reached at least Level 2 (“substantial damage”) on the Enhanced Fujita Scale (EF Scale), which measures tornado damage. About 1,000 homes in the state were damaged, according to the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency. Dozens of businesses and farms were also damaged.

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This satellite image shows two different tracks left by two separate tornadoes just outside of Tylertown, Mississippi. The longer, wider trails can stretch up to 55 miles (89 km), while the smaller trails are only about 9 miles (15 km) long. It is unclear which one appeared first or how much time passed between each twister.

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The larger of the two tornadoes is believed to have reached Level 4 (“catastrophic”) on the EF scale, making it the most powerful tornado in the entire storm system, according to NASA’s Earth Observatory. Its wind speeds may have reached 170 miles per hour (274 kilometers per hour), equivalent to a Category 5 hurricane.

Aerial photos showed separate tornadoes passing at right angles to each other, creating a large X-shape in a wooded area of ​​Covington County, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) northeast of Tyler Town, the National Weather Service in Jackson, Mississippi said.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 2025 was one of the worst years for tornadoes in the United States in recent memory. This is due in part to the recent La Niña event, which changed the trajectory of the Pacific jet stream over North America, creating drier and warmer conditions in southern states.

March was particularly extreme, with 299 twisters recorded that month, according to the National Center for Environmental Information. (For comparison, the entire United States typically averages only about 80 twisters in March.)

However, even without a La Niña event, tornado frequency has increased over time due to rising sea surface temperatures off the coast of the Gulf, which is a direct result of anthropogenic climate change.

Like other extreme weather events such as wildfires, heat waves, and floods, climate change is also making tornadoes more powerful, damaging, and deadly. For example, in 2023, a single “wedge tornado” about a mile wide tore through parts of Mississippi, killing at least 26 people.

Additionally, tornadoes are beginning to impact locations where they have historically not been seen before. Some researchers have previously suggested that the “Tornado Alley” (the region of the central United States where tornadoes are traditionally most likely to occur in states such as Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, and Nebraska) may now be considered everything east of the Rocky Mountains.

Researchers at NASA Langley Research Center are currently working on ways to better predict when tornadoes will form by analyzing cloud patterns in satellite images. The Earth Observatory says it hopes this will ultimately warn people of an impending twister 10 minutes before it occurs, potentially saving many lives.