Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 1993

F4 tornado, Hugoton, Kansas, May 5, 1993

This F4 tornado ran 23.0 miles across Stevens and Grant counties on May 5, 1993, touching down at 8:27 PM CDT and reaching 880 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $500,000 to $5 million of property damage.

The rating scale

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

  1. F040 to 72 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mph

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

  3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mphthis tornado

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 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.

The record

Rating
F4
Date
May 5, 1993
Touchdown
8:27 PM CDT (01:27 UTC)
Path length
23.0 miles (37.0 km)
Path width
880 yards (805 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$500,000 to $5 million
Counties
Stevens and Grant counties
Touchdown point
37.120, -101.270
Lift-off point
37.450, -101.220
Record number
210

What the Weather Service recorded

A 1/2 mile wide F4 tornado quickly developed near the area where the previous tornado roped out. The tornado developed six miles southeast of Hugoton. At the beginning, a multiple vortex tornado was observed. The tornado moved to the north and gradually turned and moved to the northeast. The tornado roped out two miles north of the Stevens/Grant County line. The tornado passed 4 1/2 miles to the east of Hugoton and 2 1/2 miles to the west of Moscow. A farmstead 4 1/2 miles southwest of Moscow was completely destroyed. At least 30 irrigation systems were also destroyed. A female teenager in bare feet received a cut on the foot when she stepped on broken glass at the farmstead.

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

The warnings

26 minutes of warning. NWS DDC issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:01 UTC, 26 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
22:56 UTC23:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningDDC
00:55 UTC01:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningDDC
01:01 UTC01:30 UTCTornado WarningDDC
01:29 UTC02:00 UTCTornado WarningDDC
02:15 UTC03:00 UTCTornado WarningDDC

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 forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 07:02 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 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

1.5 hours before the tornado, 130 km from the path. May 6, 1993.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1993-05-06Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2248 joules per kilogram, CIN -123, lifted condensation level 946 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 1993-05-06The 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 20 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 1 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
2248 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-123 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3071 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
946 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
1 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
20 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
57 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Dodge City, (KDDC), 12:00Z

10.5 hours after it, 130 km from the path. May 6, 1993.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1993-05-06Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 98 joules per kilogram, CIN -243, lifted condensation level 607 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 12:00Z on 1993-05-06The 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 182 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 38 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
98 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-243 J/kg
Surface CAPE
94 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
607 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
38 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
182 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
215 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
4.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Liberal_muni (LBL), 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 UTC70.8861.88130° 18 kt221008.8
01:00 UTC7061130° 19 kt231008.5
02:00 UTC6860130° 20 kt251010.2
03:00 UTC6558150° 22 kt301010.5

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

The radar

The Dodge City radar (KDDC), 124 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:29 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 1993 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 5, 1993

15 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 56:15 PM CDTF0Hansford, TX0.5100
May 55:25 PM MDTF0Dawes, NE0.150
May 56:38 PM CDTF3Texas, OK12.0500$50,000 to $500,000
May 56:55 PM CDTF0Texas, OK1.0150
May 57:10 PM CDTF1Texas, OK2.0273
May 57:47 PM CDTF0Texas, OK0.5100
May 57:50 PM CDTF0Texas, OK2.0150
May 57:54 PM CDTF3Texas, OK to KS18.51,200$5,000 to $50,000
May 57:00 PM MDTF1Box Butte, NE0.580$500 to $5,000
May 57:08 PM MDTF3Sheridan, NE13.0250$500,000 to $5 million
May 58:40 PM MDTF0Uintah, UT0.110
May 58:50 PM MDTF0Custer, SD0.150$50 to $500
May 510:00 PM CDTF0Finney, KS0.210
May 510:30 PM CDTF1Scott, KS0.320$5,000 to $50,000
May 510:10 PM MDTF0Pennington, SD0.150

What this means

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.

Sources

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.