EF3 tornado, Bern, Kansas, June 3, 2014

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 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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF3

Date

June 3, 2014

Touchdown

10:30 PM CDT (03:30 UTC)

Lifted

10:43 PM CDT (03:43 UTC)

On the ground

13 minutes

Path length

6.3 miles (10.2 km)

Path width

500 yards (457 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

2

County

Nemaha County

Touchdown point

39.970, -96.046

Lift-off point

39.927, -95.940

Record number

1406032130-01

25 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TOP, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF3. The highest wind the damage implies is 142 mph.

• hardwood trunks snapped. power poles also blown down.
• barn destroyed machinery not moved residents received WEA on phone before it hit.
• cedar row and hardwoods snapped toward the ENE
• hardwood trees snapped estimated 80-90 mph.

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

A supercell thunderstorm moved southeast out of Nebraska and produced one strong tornado in northeast Nemaha county. The supercell storm continued to track southeast and produced another tornado in Brown County.

A tornado touched down around the intersection of highway 71 and 63 around 1030 pm CDT. The damage path moved southeast and included several homes that were severely damaged and one totally destroyed. The worst damage occurred to a slab home anchored to the foundation by anchor bolts installed with nuts and washers every 12-18 inches. All exterior and interior walls were destroyed however the debris was primarily laid on top of the slab with some debris blown to the south. Two adult residents took shelter in a tub and survived with minor injuries although the tub was gone and it was suspected to have been blown into a lake to the south. The tornado damage path continued southeast for approximately 6.5 to 7.5 miles total. EF3 rating with winds to around 140 mph. The end time of the tornado was around 1043 pm CDT.

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

12 minutes of warning. NWS TOP issued a tornado warning for this county at 03:18 UTC, 12 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 03:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 02:20 UTC and running to 05:50 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 Moderate 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 01:00 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 Topeka radar (KTWX), 108 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:31 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 2014 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

7 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.