EF0 tornado, Riceville to Maple Leaf, Iowa, April 12, 2022

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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. 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

EF0

Date

April 12, 2022

Touchdown

11:10 PM CDT (04:10 UTC)

Lifted

11:16 PM CDT (04:16 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

4.5 miles (7.2 km)

Path width

125 yards (114 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$340,000

County

Howard County

Touchdown point

43.328, -92.448

Lift-off point

43.356, -92.368

Record number

2204122210-01

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

• Noted in satellite imagery. Unable to assess further.

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

Severe storms moved across northeast Iowa during the evening of April 12th. These storms produced five tornadoes and damaging wind gusts as high as 72 mph in Nora Springs (Floyd County). EF1 tornadoes occurred near Brownville (Mitchell County) and south of Riceville in both Mitchell and Howard Counties with both tornadoes damaging farm buildings and trees. EF0 tornadoes touched down in northern Floyd County into southern Mitchell County west of Orchard, near Saratoga (Howard County), and close to Ridgeway (Winneshiek County) with damage limited to trees and a few farm buildings. The Governor of Iowa issued a disaster proclamation for Howard, Mitchell, and Winneshiek Counties.

This EF1 tornado moved into Howard County south of Riceville and moved to the northeast before dissipating southeast of Riceville. Damage was mainly limited to trees.

An EF0 tornado developed southwest of Saratoga and tracked to the northeast before dissipating southeast of town. The tornado damaged trees and some farm outbuildings along its path.

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

3 minutes of warning. NWS ARX issued a tornado warning for this county at 04:07 UTC, 3 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 04:30 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 00:54 UTC and running to 05:00 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 01:01 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.

Charles City (CCY), 34 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The La Crosse radar (KARX), 112 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:09 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 2022 tornado in IowaEvery tornado in Iowa since 1950Warnings in force in Iowa nowThe forecast where you are

27 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.