EF2 tornado, Nashville to Corinth, Arkansas, May 10, 2015

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 mph

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

3. EF2111 to 135 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.

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

EF2

Date

May 10, 2015

Touchdown

11:18 PM CDT (04:18 UTC)

Lifted

11:34 PM CDT (04:34 UTC)

On the ground

16 minutes

Path length

6.7 miles (10.8 km)

Path width

400 yards (366 m)

Deaths

2

Injuries

8

Property damage

$1.5 million

County

Howard County

Touchdown point

33.931, -93.866

Lift-off point

34.028, -93.862

Record number

1505102218-01

30 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS SHV, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 127 mph.

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

Scattered showers and thunderstorms developed during the afternoon and evening hours over Northeast Texas, Southwest Arkansas, and portions of Southeast Oklahoma on May 10th, near a residual weak surface boundary draped along the Red River from showers and thunderstorms that had developed earlier in the day over Central and Southern Oklahoma. This boundary and an upper level disturbance moving in from the west during peak heating resulting in the development of multiple severe thunderstorms that produced damaging winds and isolated tornadoes. This severe weather outbreak persisted into the early morning hours of May 11th where some flash flooding also occurred across portions of the region from excessive heavy rainfall.

A damage survey was completed in Howard County Arkansas and it was determined that the damage was consistent with that of an EF2 tornado. The most extensive damage was located on the southwest side of Nashville at the D&J Mobile Home Park. Five mobile homes were completely destroyed. There were 2 fatalities in this mobile home park and 8 additional injuries. There were 40 to 60 homes suffering minor to moderate damage from the tornado...mainly from fallen trees. Other damage consisted of numerous trees snapped and/or uprooted with power lines downed as well. The Governor of Arkansas was given a tour of the damage areas on the ground and in the air.

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.

5 minutes of warning. NWS SHV issued a tornado warning for this county at 04:13 UTC, 5 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 04:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 00:39 UTC and running to 04:40 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 00:58 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.

The Western Arkansas radar (KSRX), 153 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:16 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 2015 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are

23 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.