EF1 tornado, Ezra, Illinois, June 19, 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 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

June 19, 2015

Touchdown

4:51 PM CDT (21:51 UTC)

Lifted

4:53 PM CDT (21:53 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.9 miles (1.5 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$500,000

County

Franklin County

Touchdown point

37.880, -88.959

Lift-off point

37.889, -88.971

Record number

1506191551-01

10 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PAH, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

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

Rain bands associated with the remnants of Tropical Storm Bill produced isolated tornadoes and locally very heavy rainfall. The convective character of the bands increased during the afternoon due to short intervals of sunshine that destabilized the atmosphere. The surface low pressure center that constituted the remnants of Bill was located over the extreme southeast corner of Missouri during the afternoon. Rain bands rotated northwest and westward across southern Illinois ahead of the low pressure center. The very heavy rainfall produced localized flash flooding of roads, and the Skillet Fork River crested almost 9 feet above flood stage.

A large two-story house sustained major damage, losing large portions of its roof and the front porch. A small storage shed and fencing was damaged. Near the beginning of the damage path, a garage lost most of its roof. Dozens of trees and tree limbs were broken or uprooted. At least one eyewitness saw the tornado, which began in a subdivision just west of Interstate 57 near West Frankfort. The tornado moved northwest before ending on the west side of County Road 6 near the Green River. The most intense winds were at the damaged large two-story house on County Road 6. Peak winds were estimated near 110 mph there.

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.

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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:01 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.

Marion Regional (MWA), 15 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Paducah radar (KPAH), 92 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:50 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 IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

13 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.