EF1 tornado, Jonesboro Arpt to Clay, Louisiana, May 8, 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

May 8, 2019

Touchdown

5:35 PM CDT (22:35 UTC)

Lifted

5:41 PM CDT (22:41 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

7.4 miles (11.8 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$60,000

County

Jackson Parish

Touchdown point

32.215, -92.712

Lift-off point

32.250, -92.594

Record number

1905081635-02

61 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS SHV, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

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

A strong upper level trough of low pressure extending from the Intermountain West into the Four Corners Region energized the southwest flow aloft across the Southern Plains during much of the day on May 8th, with a strong low level jet sustaining a mesoscale convective complex (MCS) across much of Oklahoma into Northcentral Texas south into the Texas Hill Country. While these storms gradually weakened after daybreak as a cold pool from these storms propagated southeast into the region, additional upper level disturbances ahead of this trough interacted with ample moisture and instability near this cold pool to intensify these showers and thunderstorms, some of which became severe with damaging winds as they moved across portions of East Texas, Southwest Arkansas, and North Louisiana. Strong low level shear was also present within the moderately unstable air mass, with discrete supercell thunderstorms developing across extreme East Texas and North Louisiana. This resulted in eleven reports of tornadoes across Northern Louisiana before the storms gradually weakened during the evening. However, locally heavy rainfall from the stronger storms persisted across portions of North Louisiana during the evening through the overnight/early morning hours of the 9th.

An EF-1 tornado with maximum estimated winds near 110 mph touched down near the Charles H. Garrett Community Center in the extreme southern portions of the city of Jonesboro where it damaged a small portion of the roof. It then crossed Highway 167 and snapped/uprooted trees along the highway and damaged a metal building where the column anchorage failed. Several more trees were snapped and uprooted along the path as it crossed Firetower Road, Highway 147, Rome Road, and Holiday Lane. The tornado then lifted after crossing Highway 4.

An EF-1 tornado with maximum estimated winds near 100 mph briefly touched down just west of Highway 167, where it snapped and uprooted approximately 15 trees as it crossed Highway 167 and then quickly lifted.

An EF-1 tornado with maximum estimated winds near 110 mph that was embedded within a squall line touched down on Poda Road where several trees were snapped. The tornado continued east, crossing Dewberry Road and Northstar Lane where numerous trees were snapped and uprooted. The tornado then crossed Caney Lake Reservoir and into Jimmie Davis State Park, where it snapped and uprooted numerous hardwood and softwood trees. Some of the trees fell into multiple campers and approximately three-fourths of the cabins in the park. The tornado lifted as it exited the north end of the State Park.

An EF-1 tornado with maximum estimated winds near 110 mph touched down in the community of Clay near Homer Sisemore Road, where it snapped and uprooted numerous trees, ripped the roof off of a small outbuilding, completely destroyed a shed, and ripped shingles off of the roof of a single family home. The tornado continued northeast, crossing Bonnie Blue Lane and tracking along Highway 167, snapping additional trees before entering extreme Southeast Lincoln Parish.

This is a continuation of the Lincoln Parish EF-1 tornado. This tornado weakened slightly as it crossed Riser Road back into Jackson Parish, with maximum estimated winds around 105 mph as it continued northeast across extreme Northwest Jackson Parish. Numerous trees were snapped and uprooted as the tornado tracked northeast across and along Edmiston Road before lifting on Countyline Road near its intersection of Edmiston Road.

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

18 minutes of warning. NWS SHV issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:17 UTC, 18 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 21:03 UTC and running to 00:20 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. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 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.

Ruston (RSN), 32 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Shreveport radar (KSHV), 114 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:33 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 LouisianaEvery tornado in Louisiana since 1950Warnings in force in Louisiana nowThe forecast where you are

17 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.