The tornado touched down near Fire Tower Road blowing off the roof of a residence and blowing over several trees. The tornado strengthened and widened to around 100 yards wide as it crossed the Food World grocery store just west of Theodore Dawes Road, taking sections of the roof off the store, and tossing several cars in the parking lot several feet. The tornado continued east across Theodore Dawes Road severely damaging a Church's Chicken restaurant, destroying a gas service station and a small metal frame shopping center. The tornado continued along Old Pascagoula road destroying a small business, destroying a wood framed home and significantly damaging several other residences and apartments. The tornado lifted as it crossed an apartment complex on Sperry Road, doing minor damage to the roof of 2 units. Mobile County Emergency Management Agency reported the tornado damaged about 25 commercial and residential structures. The damage ranged from minor to serious, with about half of the buildings in the serious category.

A powerful cold front brought widespread severe thunderstorms to southwest Alabama. These thunderstorms produced many reports of large hail...damaging winds and tornadoes. The thunderstorms also produced heavy rain which caused flash flooding.

Part of 3-tornado outbreak on March 9, 2011