EF1 tornado, Conran to Marston, Missouri, May 3, 2020

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 3, 2020

Touchdown

1:56 PM CDT (18:56 UTC)

Lifted

2:01 PM CDT (19:01 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

5.8 miles (9.4 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$500,000

County

New Madrid County

Touchdown point

36.523, -89.663

Lift-off point

36.511, -89.559

Record number

2005031256-01

12 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PAH, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 95 mph.

• Marston City Hall roof damage
• 3 power poles broke; 1 bent over

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

Numerous reports of wind damage and an isolated tornado accompanied a squall line of thunderstorms that moved rapidly east-southeast. The wind damage was mainly along and south of a line from Van Buren to Greenville to Sikeston. The atmosphere was moderately unstable, with cape values on the order of 1500 to 2000 J/kg. The relatively compact but organized and vigorous convective system maintained intensity as it progressed east to the Mississippi River. The damaging wind events occurred along and south of a surface frontal boundary, where dew points were in the mid 60's.

The EF-1 tornado damaged or destroyed several farm buildings. The farm buildings included large metal storage buildings. The concrete anchors of a shed were pulled from the ground. The tornado cut through the city of Marston, where the city hall and an apartment building were partially unroofed. At least three power poles were broken. Numerous trees were uprooted. The discernable tornado path ended in the Mississippi River flood plain. Peak winds were estimated near 95 mph.

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.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 16:44 UTC and running to 20:18 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 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 16:17 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 Paducah radar (KPAH), 97 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:55 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 2020 tornado in MissouriEvery tornado in Missouri since 1950Warnings in force in Missouri nowThe forecast where you are

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.