Tornadoes · United States · Arkansas · 1978
F2 tornado, Phillips County, Arkansas, December 3, 1978
This F2 tornado ran 0.8 miles across Phillips County on December 3, 1978, touching down at 6:50 AM CST and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $500,000 to $5 million of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
F040 to 72 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
F2113 to 157 mphthis tornado
Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.
F3158 to 206 mph
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
F5261 to 318 mph
Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.
Unrated
The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.
The record
- Rating
- F2
- Date
- December 3, 1978
- Touchdown
- 6:50 AM CST (12:50 UTC)
- Path length
- 0.8 miles (1.3 km)
- Path width
- 100 yards (91 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $500,000 to $5 million
- County
- Phillips County
- Touchdown point
- 34.520, -90.600
- Record number
- 773
The air that afternoon
The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.
Little Rock, AR (KLZK), 12:00Z
0.8 hours before the tornado, 69 km from the path. December 3, 1978.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -14077 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 3607 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 55 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 41 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 231 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 241 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.2 K/km
Little Rock, AR (KLZK), 00:00Z
11.2 hours after it, 69 km from the path. December 4, 1978.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -73109 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 3609 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 95 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 8 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 17 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- -134 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- -0.4 K/km
The surface observations
West Memphis Municipal (AWM), 76 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12:50 UTC | 190° 20 kt | 30 | TSRA |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 1978 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of December 3, 1978
12 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| December 3 | 1:50 AM CST | F4 | Bossier Parish, LA | 6.2 | 400 | 2 | 266 | $50 million to $500 million |
| December 3 | 2:00 AM CST | F2 | Ouachita, AR | 25.2 | 250 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| December 3 | 2:30 AM CST | F3 | Bossier Parish, LA | 61.1 | 10 | |||
| December 3 | 3:25 AM CST | F2 | Union, AR | 6.4 | 50 | 1 | 7 | $50,000 to $500,000 |
| December 3 | 3:30 AM CST | F1 | Jefferson, AR | 3.8 | 77 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| December 3 | 3:38 AM CST | F3 | Webster Parish, LA to AR | 60.0 | 300 | 2 | 4 | $50,000 to $500,000 |
| December 3 | 4:00 AM CST | F1 | Calhoun, AR | 8.4 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| December 3 | 4:30 AM CST | F1 | Arkansas, AR | 25.3 | 100 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| December 3 | 4:55 AM CST | F0 | Monroe, AR | 0.5 | 50 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| December 3 | 5:12 AM CST | F2 | Lee, AR | 1.0 | 100 | $500,000 to $5 million | ||
| December 3 | 5:15 AM CST | F2 | Lincoln, AR | 18.6 | 400 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| December 3 | 7:00 AM CST | F1 | Tunica, MS | 1.0 | 70 | $50,000 to $500,000 |
What this means
Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.