At 3:06 am EST (0806 UTC), the National Weather Service (NWS) issued a tornado warning for northern Lake County until 4:00 am EST (0900 UTC). At 3:10 am EST (0810 UTC), the first tornado touched down near The Villages and traveled at into Lake County. Five minutes after the tornado touched down, a severe weather update bulletin was issued by the NWS stating that there was a high likelihood of an extremely dangerous tornado and people in the path were in a life-threatening situation. The tornado received an EF3 rating on the Enhanced Fujita Scale and had a track length of . Initially, the tornado was thought to have still been on the ground and a third bulletin was released at 3:34 am EST (0834 UTC). At this time, Doppler radar indicated that a tornado was forming or was on the ground roughly north of Umatilla.