Tornadoes · United States · Nebraska · 1979

F2 tornado, Brown and Rock counties, Nebraska, July 7, 1979

This F2 tornado ran 11.1 miles across Brown and Rock counties on July 7, 1979, touching down at 6:45 PM CDT and reaching 300 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 1, and did $500,000 to $5 million of property damage.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 mphthis tornado

    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. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 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.

The record

Rating
F2
Date
July 7, 1979
Touchdown
6:45 PM CDT (23:45 UTC)
Path length
11.1 miles (17.9 km)
Path width
300 yards (274 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
1
Property damage
$500,000 to $5 million
Counties
Brown and Rock counties
Touchdown point
42.550, -99.780
Lift-off point
42.450, -99.580
Record number
482

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.

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 12:00Z

11.8 hours before the tornado, 170 km from the path. July 7, 1979.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1979-07-07Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 10 joules per kilogram, CIN -353, lifted condensation level 589 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1979-07-07The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 90 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 26 knots.193958Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
10 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-353 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
589 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
18 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
90 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
89 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 00:00Z

0.2 hours after it, 170 km from the path. July 8, 1979.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1979-07-08Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2144 joules per kilogram, CIN -52, lifted condensation level 1712 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1979-07-08The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 59 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 38 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
2144 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-52 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3423 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1712 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
38 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
59 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
158 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.3
Supercell composite
6.4
0-3 km lapse rate
8.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Ainsworth Munici (ANW), 27 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
22:00 UTC8666180° 15 kt201017.3
00:00 UTC8162120° 5 kt1017.3

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1979 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of July 7, 1979

3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
July 78:10 PM CDTF1Blaine, NE32.3100$500,000 to $5 million
July 78:20 PM CDTF1Loup, NE28.1100$500,000 to $5 million
July 710:10 PM CDTF0Potter, TX0.110

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.