Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 2010
EF0 tornado, Collyer, Kansas, May 25, 2010
This EF0 tornado ran 5.9 miles across Trego County on May 25, 2010, touching down at 10:04 PM CDT and reaching 150 yards wide. It killed nobody.
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.
EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- EF0
- Date
- May 25, 2010
- Touchdown
- 10:04 PM CDT (03:04 UTC)
- Lifted
- 10:12 PM CDT (03:12 UTC)
- On the ground
- 8 minutes
- Path length
- 5.9 miles (9.5 km)
- Path width
- 150 yards (137 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Trego County
- Touchdown point
- 38.836, -100.152
- Lift-off point
- 38.901, -100.100
- Record number
- 1005252104-01
What the Weather Service recorded
A weak s/wv through helped to promote surface cyclogenesis during the day which helped to trigger thunderstorm development.
The tornado moved out of Gove county and then the tornado turned north as it occluded but never did strike anything to damage.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
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.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21:41 UTC | 03:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Watch | GLD |
| 00:22 UTC | 01:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | GLD |
| 00:49 UTC | 01:45 UTC | Tornado Warning | GLD |
| 00:52 UTC | 04:00 UTC | Flash Flood Warning | GLD |
| 01:41 UTC | 02:18 UTC | Tornado Warning | GLD |
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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 00:58 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
3.1 hours before the tornado, 124 km from the path. May 26, 2010.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1417 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -3 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 2086 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1345 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 35 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 6 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 6 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 52 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.1
- Supercell composite
- 1.2
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 7.5 K/km
Dodge City, (KDDC), 12:00Z
8.9 hours after it, 124 km from the path. May 26, 2010.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 791 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -35 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 143 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 620 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 18 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 132 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 149 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.3
- Supercell composite
- 2.7
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.8 K/km
The radar
The Dodge City radar (KDDC), 124 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:05 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.
What was reported nearby
Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01:06 UTC | TORNADO | 4 Ne The Monument Rocks | Gove, KS | |
| 01:14 UTC | TORNADO | 6 Ne The Monument Rocks | Gove, KS | DESCRIBED AS LARGE TORNADO AND RAIN WRAPPED |
| 01:20 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 10 Sw Gove | Gove, KS | |
| 01:20 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 6 Ne The Monument Rocks | Gove, KS | |
| 01:27 UTC | TORNADO | 9 Sw Gove | Gove, KS | RELAYED BY PUBLIC DESCRIBED AS A VERY LARGE TORNADO |
| 01:28 UTC | TORNADO | 8 Ssw Gove | Gove, KS | |
| 01:48 UTC | TORNADO | 10 Se Gove | Gove, KS | |
| 02:10 UTC | TORNADO | 9 S Collyer | Trego, KS | THE TORNADO WAS MOVING EAST AT 35 MPH. CORRECTED TIME AND MOVEMENT. |
| 02:20 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | 10 Se Gove | Gove, KS | |
| 02:22 UTC | TORNADO | 9 S Collyer | Trego, KS | THE TORNADO WAS MOVING EAST AT 15 MPH. |
| 03:22 UTC | TORNADO | 3 S Ellis | Ellis, KS | TORNADO REPORTED NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF THE ELLIS BLACKTOP AND AIRBASE ROAD. |
| 03:22 UTC | TORNADO | 9 E Cedar Bluff | Ellis, KS | TORNADO REPORTED NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF THE ELLIS BLACKTOP AND ANTONINO ROAD. |
| 03:32 UTC | TORNADO | 6 W Hays | Ellis, KS |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2010 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 25, 2010
29 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 25 | 11:30 AM CDT | EF0 | Live Oak, TX | 0.2 | 25 | $5,000 | ||
| May 25 | 2:10 PM CDT | EF0 | Peoria, IL | 0.7 | 15 | |||
| May 25 | 3:13 PM MDT | EF0 | Roosevelt, NM | 0.3 | 10 | |||
| May 25 | 3:31 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.0 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 3:31 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.1 | 75 | |||
| May 25 | 3:32 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.1 | 75 | |||
| May 25 | 3:37 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.4 | 100 | |||
| May 25 | 3:41 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.2 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 3:48 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.1 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 3:48 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.3 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 3:55 PM MDT | EF0 | Curry, NM | 0.1 | 10 | |||
| May 25 | 3:55 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.3 | 75 | |||
| May 25 | 3:56 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.1 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 3:56 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.2 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 4:07 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 1.2 | 75 | |||
| May 25 | 4:18 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.2 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 5:17 PM MDT | EF0 | Greeley, KS | 0.8 | 10 | |||
| May 25 | 5:20 PM MDT | EF0 | Kiowa, CO | 0.1 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 5:49 PM MDT | EF0 | Greeley, KS | 0.6 | 25 | |||
| May 25 | 7:52 PM CDT | EF0 | Castro, TX | 0.2 | 50 | |||
| May 25 | 8:06 PM CDT | EF0 | Gove, KS | 0.3 | 10 | |||
| May 25 | 8:11 PM CDT | EF0 | Castro, TX | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| May 25 | 8:14 PM CDT | EF0 | Castro, TX | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| May 25 | 8:14 PM CDT | EF0 | Gove, KS | 4.8 | 75 | |||
| May 25 | 8:26 PM CDT | EF1 | Gove, KS | 21.3 | 75 | $23,000 | ||
| May 25 | 8:44 PM CDT | EF1 | Gove, KS | 9.9 | 50 | $25,000 | ||
| May 25 | 7:52 PM MDT | EF0 | Baca, CO | 1.1 | 75 | $10,000 | ||
| May 25 | 8:00 PM MDT | EF1 | Baca, CO | 2.5 | 300 | $5,000 | ||
| May 25 | 10:20 PM CDT | EF0 | Ellis, KS | 6.9 | 75 |
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.