Tornadoes · United States · Nebraska · 2014
EF0 tornado, Agate, Nebraska, May 18, 2014
This EF0 tornado ran 2.1 miles across Sioux County on May 18, 2014, touching down at 6:35 PM MDT and reaching 30 yards wide. It killed nobody.
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 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
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
- EF0
- Date
- May 18, 2014
- Touchdown
- 6:35 PM MDT (00:35 UTC)
- Lifted
- 6:40 PM MDT (00:40 UTC)
- On the ground
- 5 minutes
- Path length
- 2.1 miles (3.3 km)
- Path width
- 30 yards (27 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Sioux County
- Touchdown point
- 42.010, -103.450
- Lift-off point
- 42.030, -103.420
- Record number
- 1405181835-01
What the Weather Service recorded
Thunderstorms produced numerous funnel clouds, large hail, damaging winds and a weak tornado.
A weak tornado touched down in open country about 7 miles north-northeast of Lake Minatare and was on the ground for five minutes. No damage was reported.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
0 minutes of warning. NWS CYS issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:35 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:51 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 22:27 UTC | 23:13 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | CYS |
| 23:09 UTC | 00:15 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | CYS |
| 00:35 UTC | 00:51 UTC | Tornado Warning | CYS |
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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 20:00 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.
Rapid City, SD (KRAP), 00:00Z
0.6 hours before the tornado, 232 km from the path. May 19, 2014.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 197 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -316 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1272 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 2188 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 56 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 3 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 26 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 123 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.1
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 7.0 K/km
Rapid City, SD (KRAP), 12:00Z
11.4 hours after it, 232 km from the path. May 19, 2014.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 3 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -325 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 15 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1886 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 41 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 10 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -69 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- -47 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 6.3 K/km
The surface observations
Scottsbluff (BFF), 21 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22:46 UTC | 77 | 53 | 110° 13 kt | 1004.1 | VCTS | |
| 22:53 UTC | 77 | 53 | 120° 12 kt | 1003.7 | VCTS | |
| 23:51 UTC | 73.4 | 53.6 | 70° 11 kt | 1002.7 | TS | |
| 23:53 UTC | 73 | 53 | 60° 15 kt | 22 | 1002.7 | TS |
| 00:16 UTC | 77 | 54 | 50° 9 kt | 1002.7 | VCTS | |
| 00:36 UTC | 78 | 51 | 4 kt | 1003 | ||
| 00:53 UTC | 76 | 52 | 60° 7 kt | 1002.7 | ||
| 01:53 UTC | 71 | 51 | 90° 10 kt | 1002.7 |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Cheyenne radar (KCYS), 149 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:34 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22:33 UTC | HAIL 0.5 | 7 Nw Morrill | Sioux, NE | |
| 22:40 UTC | HAIL 0.5 | 7 N Morrill | Sioux, NE | SOME DIME SIZED. |
| 00:25 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 15 N Scottsbluff | Sioux, NE | 622 PM 2 FUNNEL CLOUDS OBSERVED. THIRD FUNNEL CLOUD TOUCHED DOWN FROM 632 THRU 637 PM 7NNE LAKE MINATARE. TORNADO WAS IN OPEN AREA AND NO DAMAGE WAS OBSERVED. 3 FUNNEL CLOUDS OBSERVED AT 650 PM ON THE MORRILL BOX BUTTE C |
| 00:33 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 15 Ne Scottsbluff | Sioux, NE | NARROW FUNNEL CLOUD AND POSSIBLE BRIEF TORNADO ON STORM NE OF SCOTTSBLUFF. HAS PHOTOS |
| 00:34 UTC | TORNADO | 3 Nne Lake Minatare | Scotts Bluff, NE | SEVERAL SPOTTERS REPORTED A TORNADO. |
| 01:08 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Alliance | Box Butte, NE | PRONOUNCED WALL CLOUD WITH FUNNEL GOING UP AND DOWN. GOOD ROTATION IN WALL CLOUD. |
| 01:16 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 4 Sw Hemingford | Box Butte, NE | HIGHWAY PATROL TROOPER SW OF HEMMINGFORD WAS LOOKING TO THE SOUTHWEST AT THE STORM AND OBSERVED A FUNNEL. |
| 01:16 UTC | HAIL 1 | 17 Wnw Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:27 UTC | HAIL 0.5 | 10 Sw Hemingford | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:34 UTC | HAIL 1 | 5 W Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:45 UTC | HAIL 0.88 | 9 W Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:45 UTC | HAIL 1 | 5 N Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:50 UTC | HAIL 0.5 | 8 Ne Alliance | Box Butte, NE | PEA TO DIME HAIL WITH HEAVY RAIN |
| 01:54 UTC | HAIL 0.25 | 6 Ne Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 01:55 UTC | HAIL 0.5 | 2 N Alliance | Box Butte, NE | |
| 02:00 UTC | HAIL 1.5 | 4 N Alliance | Box Butte, NE | MOST WERE 1 INCH |
| 02:06 UTC | HAIL 1 | 9 Ne Alliance | Box Butte, NE |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2014 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 18, 2014
2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
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.