Tornadoes · United States · Colorado · 2026

Unrated tornado, Bent County, Colorado, June 26, 2026

This Unrated tornado ran 0.2 miles across Bent County on June 26, 2026, touching down at 6:52 PM MDT. It killed nobody.

Preliminary. This is NWS PUB's damage survey, filed in the Damage Assessment Toolkit. The rating, the path and the casualties are the survey's and can change while it is revised. The Storm Prediction Center compiles the official record of 2026 from these surveys and publishes it in the spring of 2027; this page moves to that tornado's permanent address when it does.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  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 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. Unratedthis tornado

    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 survey

Rating, as surveyed
Unrated, preliminary
Date
June 26, 2026
Touchdown
6:52 PM MDT (00:52 UTC)
Lifted
6:53 PM MDT (00:53 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.2 miles (0.4 km)
Path width
0 yards (0 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Bent County
Touchdown point
38.142, -103.107
Lift-off point
38.145, -103.104
Surveyed by
NWS PUB
Survey last edited
September 28, 2026
Record number
None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

What the survey found

Brief spin-up tornado was observed along the leading edge of a organized bowing segment of thunderstorms.

Written by NWS PUB in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

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.

Dodge City, (KDDC), 00:00Z

0.9 hours before the tornado, 284 km from the path. June 27, 2026.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 2026-06-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1475 joules per kilogram, CIN -59, lifted condensation level 892 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 2026-06-27The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 71 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 32 knots.193958Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
1475 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-59 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2759 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
892 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
71 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
103 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.4
Supercell composite
3.4
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

La Junta Municipal (LHX), 37 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
00:00 UTC

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

The radar

The Pueblo radar (KPUX), 100 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:54 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 2026 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 26, 2026

4 more have been surveyed in the United States that day, so far.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 266:01 PM CDTUnratedMississippi, MO0.125
June 266:03 PM CDTEF1Douglas, MO0.575
June 266:52 PM CDTEF0Webster, MO1.575
June 269:03 PM EDTEF0Clark, IN0.325

What this means

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

Sources

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.