Tornadoes · United States · Missouri · 2024
EF1 tornado, (Jln)Joplin Muni Arp, Missouri, May 2, 2024
This EF1 tornado ran 0.8 miles across Jasper County on May 2, 2024, touching down at 1:40 PM CDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $30,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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.
The record
- Rating
- EF1
- Date
- May 2, 2024
- Touchdown
- 1:40 PM CDT (18:40 UTC)
- Lifted
- 1:42 PM CDT (18:42 UTC)
- On the ground
- 2 minutes
- Path length
- 0.8 miles (1.2 km)
- Path width
- 100 yards (91 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $30,000
- County
- Jasper County
- Touchdown point
- 37.155, -94.520
- Lift-off point
- 37.160, -94.510
- Record number
- 2405021240-01
The damage survey
5 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS SGF, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 90 mph.
- Roof suffered shingle damage, trees uprooted
- Trees uprooted. A tree fell on a home causing significant damage.
Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.
What the Weather Service recorded
Storms developed along a cold front, with rotation developing in Jasper County near Joplin. Areas of rotation continued to track through Jasper and Barton counties, with a confirmed tornado in Jasper County near Carl Junction.
NWS survey confirmed an EF-1 tornado with maximum wind speeds of 90 mph uprooted and or damaged numerous trees, including one that caused significant damage to a home as it fell. Four additional homes had roof and or siding damage.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
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.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11:58 UTC | 15:00 UTC | Flood Advisory | SGF |
| 18:42 UTC | 19:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | SGF |
| 19:11 UTC | 22:15 UTC | Flash Flood Warning | SGF |
| 19:14 UTC | 19:28 UTC | Tornado Warning | SGF |
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 forecast that day
The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 16:05 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 air that afternoon
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.
Springfield, MO (KSGF), 12:00Z
6.7 hours before the tornado, 70 km from the path. May 2, 2024.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -89152 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 351 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1956 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 8 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 32 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 95 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 134 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.1 K/km
Springfield, MO (KSGF), 00:00Z
5.3 hours after it, 70 km from the path. May 3, 2024.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 59 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -2 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 320 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 507 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 30 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 24 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 203 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 247 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.1
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.5 K/km
The radar
The Springfield radar (KSGF), 99 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:41 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.
What was reported nearby
Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18:40 UTC | TORNADO | Carl Junction | Jasper, MO | Suspected tornado downed trees and caused minor structural damage to homes northwest of the Joplin airport around Carl Junction. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2024 tornado in MissouriEvery tornado in Missouri since 1950Warnings in force in Missouri nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 2, 2024
7 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2 | 10:09 AM CDT | EF1 | Sabine Parish, LA | 5.2 | 325 | |||
| May 2 | 11:32 AM CDT | Unrated | Jefferson Davis Parish, LA | 0.0 | 1 | |||
| May 2 | 3:58 PM CDT | EF0 | , PR | 0.5 | 4 | $8,000 | ||
| May 2 | 5:53 PM CDT | EF2 | Runnels, TX | 4.5 | 390 | |||
| May 2 | 6:29 PM CDT | Unrated | Jones, TX | 0.8 | 100 | |||
| May 2 | 6:39 PM CDT | EF2 | Concho, TX | 6.1 | 395 | |||
| May 2 | 7:06 PM CDT | EF3 | Jones, TX | 3.3 | 210 | 4 |
What this means
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.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.