EF0 tornado, Rossville to Kiro, Kansas, May 26, 2016

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

May 26, 2016

Touchdown

4:06 PM CDT (21:06 UTC)

Lifted

4:09 PM CDT (21:09 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

1.8 miles (2.9 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Shawnee County

Touchdown point

39.094, -95.859

Lift-off point

39.095, -95.825

Record number

1605261506-01

1 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TOP, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 80 mph.

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

Another round of severe thunderstorms brought more pain and hardship to the area in the form of large hail, damaging winds, flooding rains and 3 more tornadoes. The strongest tornado hit Wamego and areas just north of Wamego but thankfully it was a weak tornado producing EF1 damage north of the city and EF0 damage in the town. A second brief tornado was caught on video just southwest of Rossville while a third tornado did damage to Silver Lake. Both the Rossville and Silver Lake tornadoes were embedded in a bow echo so their damage occurred within a larger area of 60-80 mph wind and associated damage.

Video of a brief tornado was produced showing a circulation in an open field. The chasers stated that the tornado was present for around one minute before lifting. No damage.

Small tornado was apparently embedded within a bow echo that moved across Silver Lake. The straight line winds associated with the bow echo produced more widespread damage both north and south of highway 24 where several irrigation pivots were overturned. A more concentrated area of tree and minor structural damage occurred south of highway 24 beginning in southwest parts of Silver Lake and continuing ENE for approximately 1.5 miles. One outbuilding was severely damaged where appeared the wind entered on the southwest side and contributed to the failure of the structure.

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

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.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 18:32 UTC and running to 01:40 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 19:57 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), 35 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:04 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 2016 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

14 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.