EF1 tornado, Wheeler to Bird City Arpt, Kansas, August 11, 2019

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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF1

Date

August 11, 2019

Touchdown

7:47 PM CDT (00:47 UTC)

Lifted

7:52 PM CDT (00:52 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

1.2 miles (2.0 km)

Path width

175 yards (160 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$50,000

County

Cheyenne County

Touchdown point

39.681, -101.658

Lift-off point

39.695, -101.643

Record number

1908111847-01

19 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS GLD, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

• Approximate end of tornado path. Was a path noted in a corn field. Land owner stated the path ended near center of field.
• Approximate beginning of tornado path.
• windows blown out of tractor. not sure if smashed by debris or blown out by wind
• debris pulled east into pheasant coop.

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

A significant severe weather event occurred across the Tri-State Region on the evening of August 11th, 2019. Widespread damaging winds, heavy rainfall, and flash flooding was reported to NWS Goodland. In addition, a few tornadoes occurred along with some large hail. The event began with a couple supercell thunderstorms over Yuma County Colorado and Cheyenne County Kansas. These are the primary storms that produced the large hail and tornadoes. The event evolved with several lines of storms forming, including a large line of storms that moved across Cheyenne, Rawlins, Decatur, Norton, Sherman, Thomas, Sheridan, and Graham counties in northwest Kansas. A second line of storms produced wind damage in Cheyenne County Colorado. These storms later produced heavy rain across Wallace, Logan, and Gove counties in Northwest Kansas.

A tornado struck a farmstead southeast of Wheeler, KS. This tornado produced damage consisting of trees either uprooted or snapped, and damage to farm machinery from flying debris, being tossed, or the strength of the wind itself. A sturdy farm outbuilding collapsed and several lean-to shelters collapsed. Many fences were blown over. A grain bin was blown more than a tenth of a mile away.

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

4 minutes of warning. NWS GLD issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:43 UTC, 4 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:11 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 20:46 UTC and running to 04:00 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:44 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.

St Francis (SYF), 15 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Goodland radar (KGLD), 36 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:44 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 2019 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

11 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.