Tornadoes · United States · Arkansas · 1995
F1 tornado, Lakeview, Arkansas, November 11, 1995
This F1 tornado ran 0.9 miles across Phillips County on November 11, 1995, touching down at 12:38 AM CST and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $50,000 to $500,000 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 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
F2113 to 157 mph
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
- F1
- Date
- November 11, 1995
- Touchdown
- 12:38 AM CST (06:38 UTC)
- Path length
- 0.9 miles (1.4 km)
- Path width
- 50 yards (46 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $50,000 to $500,000
- County
- Phillips County
- Touchdown point
- 34.420, -90.800
- Record number
- 1187
What the Weather Service recorded
A tornado touched down along a road in Lakeview. Three homes, two of which were brick, were heavily damaged. One mobile home was destroyed. Another mobile home was moved off its foundation. Three to four other homes received minor damage. Numerous trees had twisted and broken limbs with pieces of tin roofing and other debris hanging from the trees and power lines. Two large trees were uprooted and moved 25 feet. One of the trees had a field disker entangled in it.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 06:18 UTC | 07:15 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | MEG |
| 06:46 UTC | 07:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | MEG |
Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.
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), 00:00Z
6.6 hours before the tornado, 90 km from the path. November 11, 1995.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 755 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -24 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 3 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 549 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 51 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 40 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 409 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 509 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 7.4
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.0 K/km
Little Rock, AR (KLZK), 12:00Z
5.4 hours after it, 90 km from the path. November 11, 1995.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -83987 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 705 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 87 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 29 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -192 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 1 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 3.3 K/km
The radar
The Memphis radar (KNQA), 133 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 06:36 UTC.
Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track
Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 1995 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of November 11, 1995
29 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| November 11 | 1:45 AM CST | F1 | Chicot, AR | 2.0 | 100 | 2 | $5,000 to $50,000 | |
| November 11 | 3:10 AM CST | F3 | Madison, MS | 15.0 | 200 | 2 | $50,000 to $500,000 | |
| November 11 | 4:55 AM CST | F3 | Covington, MS | 7.0 | 400 | 2 | $50,000 to $500,000 | |
| November 11 | 5:15 AM CST | F1 | Walthall, MS | 3.0 | 20 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 8:57 AM CST | F1 | Walton, FL | 0.2 | 50 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:00 AM CST | F0 | Houston, AL | 0.1 | 10 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:06 AM CST | F1 | Walton, FL | 0.1 | 30 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 10:08 AM EST | F1 | Decatur, GA | 0.1 | 30 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 10:30 AM EST | F1 | Grady, GA | 1.0 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:32 AM CST | F1 | Washington, FL | 0.1 | 20 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 10:40 AM EST | F1 | Grady, GA | 2.0 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:54 AM CST | F0 | Calhoun, FL | 0.1 | 10 | |||
| November 11 | 11:10 AM EST | F1 | Thomas, GA | 0.1 | 50 | 1 | $5,000 to $50,000 | |
| November 11 | 11:20 AM EST | F1 | Brooks, GA | 0.3 | 73 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 11:27 AM EST | F1 | Gadsden, FL | 5.0 | 100 | |||
| November 11 | 11:50 AM EST | F1 | Leon, FL | 0.5 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 11:50 AM EST | F0 | Franklin, FL | 0.1 | 20 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| November 11 | 2:10 PM EST | F0 | Wakulla, FL | 0.1 | 20 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 7:30 PM EST | F0 | Harford, MD | 0.5 | 100 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 7:50 PM EST | F1 | Edgecombe, NC | 1.0 | 100 | 3 | $5,000 to $50,000 | |
| November 11 | 8:00 PM EST | F0 | Saint Mary's, MD | 0.8 | 73 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 8:05 PM EST | F1 | City of Suffolk, VA | 0.8 | 100 | 1 | $50,000 to $500,000 | |
| November 11 | 8:10 PM EST | F0 | Saint Mary's, MD | 0.1 | 50 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| November 11 | 8:15 PM EST | F2 | Northampton, NC | 0.3 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 8:50 PM EST | F1 | Accomack, VA | 2.0 | 100 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| November 11 | 8:55 PM EST | F0 | Hillsborough, FL | 1.2 | 50 | 2 | $5,000 to $50,000 | |
| November 11 | 9:00 PM EST | F1 | Gates, NC | 2.2 | 100 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:20 PM EST | F0 | Worcester, MD | 0.5 | 50 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| November 11 | 9:25 PM EST | F1 | Pasquotank, NC | 1.0 | 100 | $5,000 to $50,000 |
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.