F3 tornado, Junction City, Arkansas, January 12, 2005

1. F040 to 72 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. F173 to 112 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. 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.

4. F3158 to 206 mphthis tornado

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. F4207 to 260 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. 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.

7. 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.

Rating

F3

Date

January 12, 2005

Touchdown

11:25 PM CST (05:25 UTC)

Path length

24.0 miles (38.6 km)

Path width

900 yards (823 m)

Deaths

2

Injuries

13

Property damage

$3.0 million

County

Union County

Touchdown point

33.020, -92.730

Lift-off point

33.230, -92.450

Record number

510

The tornado that moved through Claiborne Parish Louisiana moved northeast into Union County Arkansas. The tornado first struck the community of Junction City, Arkansas just north of the Arkansas, Louisiana state line. From the area surveyed, the tornado was on the ground continuously from touchdown to end. For the early part of the track, the damage was confined to minor damage to homes with numerous trees downed from Junction City to near Tatum Rd approximately 8 miles south of El Dorado. In Junction City, two people were injured when a tree fell on their home as they were in bed. As the tornado approached Tatum Rd, it appears to have intensified significantly while growing wider in its destruction. It was through the area from Tatum Rd, across Hwy 7 and into the vicinity of Rushwood Rd that the storm did its greatest damage. Numerous homes, both mobile and well constructed frame homes were either destroyed or heavily damaged. A number of vehicles were rolled and tossed through the air, landing several yards from their initial location. It was in the area of Tatum Rd through Rushwood Rd that two fatalities occurred, both of them elderly residents. The majority of the injuries also occurred in this area. After leaving the Rushwood Rd area, the storm began to weaken and decreasing in path width. Except for minor structural damage to buildings in Lawson, trees downed or broken was the main damage for the latter part of the track.

The deaths

2 direct deaths are recorded for this tornado, each with what Storm Data knows of it.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:03 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

El Dorado/Goodwin (ELD), 23 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2005 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are

4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.