EF1 tornado, Island to Riverdale, Arkansas, December 19, 2012

1. EF065 to 85 mph

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

2. EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado

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

3. EF2111 to 135 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. EF3136 to 165 mph

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

5. EF4166 to 200 mph

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

6. EF5over 200 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

EF1

Date

December 19, 2012

Touchdown

9:46 PM CST (03:46 UTC)

Lifted

9:49 PM CST (03:49 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

3.0 miles (4.8 km)

Path width

650 yards (594 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$400,000

County

Sebastian County

Touchdown point

35.399, -94.119

Lift-off point

35.421, -94.077

Record number

1212192146-01

7 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TSA, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

• Three chicken houses lost a large portion of roof panels
• Fire Department lost side and roof panels.
• Three chicken houses lost much of their roof panels.
• Travel trailer was throw and mobile home lost much of its roof and windows.

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

A line of severe thunderstorms developed over eastern Oklahoma during the early evening hours of the 19th as a cold front moved into the region from the west. The thunderstorms moved rapidly eastward into Arkansas, producing damaging wind, large hail, and a tornado across west central Arkansas.

The tornado developed near Highway 96 north of Union Road where it damaged a permanent home and trees. It moved northeast uprooting or snapping numerous hardwood and softwood trees and damaging chicken houses and outbuildings. The tornado damaged the sides and roof of a fire station on County Road 68, tore the roof off a double wide mobile home north of County Road 68, then destroyed a double wide mobile home and tore the roofs off of three chicken houses before moving into a wooded area. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in the tornado was 100 to 110 mph.

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

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.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 01:36 UTC and running to 04:46 UTC.

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 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 01:00 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.

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.

Fort Smith Municipal (FSM), 26 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Western Arkansas radar (KSRX), 27 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:45 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.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2012 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are

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.