Alert archive / Oklahoma / Tornado Watches in 1997

Tornado Watch 262

May 7, 199717 counties in Kansas; 19 counties in Oklahoma; 8 counties in Texas

The Storm Prediction Center issued this tornado watch at May 7, 1997, 4:30 PM CDT for 17 counties in Kansas; 19 counties in Oklahoma; 8 counties in Texas. It was in force for 6 hr.

The area

The outline as issued.

The facts

Issued: May 7, 1997, 4:30 PM CDT (21:30 UTC)
Expired: May 7, 1997, 10:00 PM CDT
In force: 6 hr
Issued by: the Storm Prediction Center

All 44 counties

Barber County, KS, Butler County, KS, Chase County, KS, Comanche County, KS, Harper County, KS, Harvey County, KS, Kingman County, KS, Kiowa County, KS, Lyon County, KS, Marion County, KS, McPherson County, KS, Pratt County, KS, Reno County, KS, Rice County, KS, Sedgwick County, KS, Stafford County, KS, Sumner County, KS, Alfalfa County, OK, Beckham County, OK, Blaine County, OK, Custer County, OK, Dewey County, OK, Ellis County, OK, Garfield County, OK, Grant County, OK, Greer County, OK, Harmon County, OK, Harper County, OK, Jackson County, OK, Kingfisher County, OK, Kiowa County, OK, Major County, OK, Roger Mills County, OK, Washita County, OK, Woods County, OK, Woodward County, OK, Briscoe County, TX, Childress County, TX, Collingsworth County, TX, Donley County, TX, Gray County, TX, Hall County, TX, Hemphill County, TX, Wheeler County, TX

The radar

The Vance AFB radar (KVNX), 133 km from the middle of the area, began a volume at 21:30 UTC, the scan nearest the moment this went out.

Open the radar archive at this moment

The archived warnings, watches and discussions in force at that minute are drawn over the scan, this one among them.

Warnings issued inside it

32 tornado, severe thunderstorm and flash flood warnings for its counties while it was in force.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
May 7, 4:36 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	DDC	Barber	34 min
May 7, 4:43 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Harper	62 min
May 7, 5:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Alfalfa, Grant	45 min
May 7, 5:45 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Harper	65 min
May 7, 5:50 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	McPherson, Saline	60 min
May 7, 6:04 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	OUN	Grant	26 min
May 7, 6:26 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	OUN	Grant	34 min
May 7, 6:52 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	McPherson, Saline	63 min
May 7, 6:57 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	OUN	Grant	48 min
May 7, 7:05 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Marion	65 min
May 7, 7:10 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Gray	65 min
May 7, 7:26 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	TOP	Lyon	44 min
May 7, 7:36 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	OUN	Grant, Kay	39 min
May 7, 7:38 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	AMA	Gray	52 min
May 7, 7:49 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	McPherson, Saline	56 min
May 7, 7:49 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Ellis	41 min
May 7, 8:07 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Hemphill, Wheeler	68 min
May 7, 8:10 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Marion	60 min
May 7, 8:12 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	TOP	Coffey, Lyon, Osage	48 min
May 7, 8:15 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Grant	45 min
May 7, 8:24 PM CDT	Flash Flood Warning	OUN	Grant	3 hr
May 7, 8:27 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	ICT	Chase	48 min
May 7, 8:27 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Donley, Gray	63 min
May 7, 8:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Ellis, Roger Mills	60 min
May 7, 8:51 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Collingsworth	69 min
May 7, 9:07 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Beckham	53 min
May 7, 9:15 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Wheeler	30 min
May 7, 9:17 PM CDT	Tornado Warning	AMA	Donley	28 min
May 7, 9:29 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Grant, Kay	46 min
May 7, 9:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Roger Mills	45 min
May 7, 9:47 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	OUN	Custer, Washita	43 min
May 7, 9:59 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	AMA	Collingsworth	46 min

The nearest sounding before it

Lamont, OK (KLMN), launched 12:00Z, 9.5 hours before the alert went out and 178 km from the middle of its area. This is the routine balloon launch nearest before it, the air the forecaster had in hand, not a measurement taken for the alert.

Skew-T log-p

Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed.

Hodograph

The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km.

Mixed-layer CAPE: 136 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -134 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 925 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 31 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 65 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 161 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.0
Supercell composite: 0.2

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The text

The text of this product is not in the archive. The NWS text archive before 2002 is incomplete.

SPC that day

Everything else SPC issued on the same UTC day.

Issued	Product	Office	Counties	Lasted
May 7, 2:00 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Atchison, Brown, Clay, Cloud, Dickinson, Doniphan and 20 more	5 hr
May 7, 6:15 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Atchison, Brown, Dickinson, Doniphan, Douglas, Geary and 11 more	6 hr
May 7, 6:45 PM CDT	Tornado Watch	SPC	Allen, Anderson, Bourbon, Chautauqua, Cherokee, Coffey and 14 more	6 hr
May 6, 8:45 PM CDT	Tornado Watch	SPC	Beaver, Harmon	6 hr
May 6, 11:00 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Alfalfa, Beckham, Blaine, Caddo, Canadian, Comanche and 15 more	5 hr
May 7, 5:00 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Cotton, Tillman	6 hr
May 6, 8:30 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Andrews, Borden, Coke, Concho, Crane, Dawson and 27 more	6 hr
May 7, 6:45 PM CDT	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	SPC	Armstrong, Bailey, Briscoe, Carson, Castro, Childress and 20 more	6 hr

Nearby

Tornado Watches in Oklahoma, 1997 Tornado Watches in Kansas, 1997 Tornado Watches in Texas, 1997 Every tornado watch in 1997

Sources

The product and its follow-ups from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service and Storm Prediction Center text; the sounding from the Mesonet's radiosonde archive; radar from the NEXRAD Level II archive.