EF1 tornado, Howells, Nebraska, July 12, 2023

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

July 12, 2023

Touchdown

5:14 AM CDT (10:14 UTC)

Lifted

5:15 AM CDT (10:15 UTC)

On the ground

1 minutes

Path length

0.3 miles (0.4 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Colfax County

Touchdown point

41.727, -97.013

Lift-off point

41.724, -97.011

Record number

2307120414-01

3 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS OAX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

• Garage walls shifted 6 inches off foundation. Damage to roof and home with some siding torn off. Resident reported that the most intense wind occurred very quickly and then was over.
• Many large limbs snapped along Center Street. Some shingles removed from a residence.

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

A widespread significant damaging wind storm tracked across nearly all of eastern Nebraska and western Iowa on the morning of July 12. These storms produced widespread winds of 60 to 80 mph, with embedded stronger downbursts with wind speeds up to 100 mph. The strongest measured wind gust was 82 mph in Dodge County NE, but some of the high-end straight line wind damage supports embedded wind speeds up to 100 mph.||This storm also produced a few embedded tornadoes. Some of the tornado tracks were only identified by narrow swaths of damage through mature cornfields, with minimal damage otherwise and peak wind speeds similar to the nearby downburst winds. All but one of the tornadoes was preceded by a Wireless Emergency Alert. There were 0 reported injuries or fatalities.

A likely tornado embedded within a broader area of downburst winds appears to have impacted homes and trees on the west side of Howells, causing roof damage and shifting the walls of a garage. Beyond this area, it was difficult to discern any particular tornado damage from straight line wind damage, but there was additional damage to trees, fences, and a power substation on the south side of Howells as well.

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 05:12 UTC and running to 11:54 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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 05:51 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.

Columbus Municipal (OLU), 41 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Omaha radar (KOAX), 70 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 10:15 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 2023 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are

23 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.