EF1 tornado, Culler to Slovak, Arkansas, March 9, 2019

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

March 9, 2019

Touchdown

10:48 AM CST (16:48 UTC)

Lifted

11:06 AM CST (17:06 UTC)

On the ground

18 minutes

Path length

10.8 miles (17.4 km)

Path width

300 yards (274 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$310,000

Counties

Lonoke and Prairie counties

Touchdown point

34.626, -91.812

Lift-off point

34.729, -91.670

Record number

1903091048-01

24 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LZK, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 105 mph.

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

A strong storm system brought severe weather to the region on the 9th. Severe thunderstorms produced wind damage and a few tornadoes. In additional to thunderstorms producing damage, non-thunderstorm winds were very strong as the system departed, which also caused damage well behind the thunderstorms.

Several metal farm buildings were either damaged or destroyed, along with many power poles snapped. This tornado then continued into Prairie County near the intersection of West Zion Road and County Road 817.

This tornado formed near the community of Hamilton where a home was damaged along with some trees uprooted or snapped. This tornado continued northeast of Peterson Lake into Prairie County .

This tornado moved out of Lonoke County into Prairie County near the intersection of West Zion Road and County Road 817. Additional damage from this tornado was limited to broken power poles along the track in Prairie County.

This tornado continued northeast out of Lonoke County into rural southwest Prairie county, uprooting some trees along the path. Near the end of the path, metal roofing material was removed from a metal farm building along South Lisko Road.

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

22 minutes of warning. NWS LZK issued a tornado warning for this county at 16:26 UTC, 22 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 17:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 16:36 UTC and running to 19:24 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 16:14 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 Little Rock radar (KLZK), 51 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:47 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 2019 tornado in ArkansasEvery tornado in Arkansas since 1950Warnings in force in Arkansas nowThe forecast where you are

11 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.