La Plata, Maryland

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Tornadoes

La Plata has been affected by two major tornadoes in its history.

On November 9, 1926, an F4 tornado killed 17 people, 14 of them in the La Plata Elementary School, which was destroyed.

On April 28, 2002, another F4 tornado cut a 24-mile-long (39 km) swath through Charles County, with areas around La Plata damaged most severely. This tornado caused four deaths. Local officials credited federal- and state-assisted new construction efforts with helping them to remodel the downtown area following the tornado, as several new public buildings replaced some of those damaged there. A new La Plata Town Hall, for example, became Southern Maryland's first LEED certified building, and an old building considered historic by local residents, which housed a CVS Pharmacy store at the time of the tornado, was rebuilt in a new location after the storm. In the days after the tornado, help was provided by twenty-seven different jurisdictions, as well as the nearby Amish community in St. Mary's County.

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