EF2 tornado, Trousdale to Greensburg, Kansas, May 5, 2007

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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF2

Date

May 5, 2007

Touchdown

7:22 PM CDT (00:22 UTC)

Lifted

8:07 PM CDT (01:07 UTC)

On the ground

45 minutes

Path length

26.9 miles (43.2 km)

Path width

880 yards (805 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Counties

Kiowa, Edwards, Pratt and Stafford counties

Touchdown point

37.677, -99.100

Lift-off point

38.029, -98.927

Record number

0705051822-01

Unbelievably, an outbreak of tornadoes, some very large in size, raked the earth in basically the same area as the day before when Greensburg was nearly completely leveled. Although some of the tornadoes were large and apparently very strong, there was no loss of life on this day. A National Weather Service assessment team was in an area about 30 minutes before a tornado moved through. They also saw one tornado during the storm survey of damage that was produced the day before.

Damage was done to trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers.

This tornado occurred in very close proximately to a tornado less than 24 hours earlier. It eventually moved into Edwards county at 1930 CDT and caused EF1 damage to trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers.

This tornado did EF1 damage to trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers. It occurred in very close proximately to a tornado less than 24 hours earlier. It moved into Pratt county at 1837 CST.

This tornado did EF2 damage to farms, trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers. It occurred in very close proximately to a tornado less than 24 hours earlier (less than 1/2 of a mile). It into the county from Edwards county and then moved into Stafford county at 1842 CST.

This tornado did EF2 damage to farms, trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers. It was very large in size. It eventually moved into Pawnee county at 1905 CST.

This tornado did EF1 damage to trees and a several pivot irrigation sprinklers.

This wedge tornado was occurring simultaneously to another large but smaller tornado (within several miles). Damage was done to houses, trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers.|

This large tornado was occurring simultaneously with a larger tornado to the west. It did EF1 damage to trees and pivot irrigation sprinklers.

This tornado caused EF1 damage to trees, pivot irrigation sprinklers and several homes. It moved into Barton county at 2003 CST.

While doing a storm survey and in the town of Greensburg, this tornado was observed moving rapidly north but west of Greensburg. It did EF1 damage to a barn.

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

22 minutes of warning. NWS DDC issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:00 UTC, 22 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 17:15 UTC and running to 02:12 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 High Risk, with a 0.30 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 20:05 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 Dodge City radar (KDDC), 85 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:23 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 2007 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

96 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 97 of them

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.