EF2 tornado, Arnold to Anselmo, Nebraska, June 7, 2024

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 mph

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

3. EF2111 to 135 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. 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

EF2

Date

June 7, 2024

Touchdown

5:19 PM CDT (22:19 UTC)

Lifted

5:25 PM CDT (22:25 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

1.7 miles (2.8 km)

Path width

750 yards (686 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$80,000

County

Custer County

Touchdown point

41.539, -100.058

Lift-off point

41.528, -100.028

Record number

2406071619-01

10 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LBF, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EFU. The highest wind the damage implies is 120 mph.

• Multiple cross members on power pole snapped and down. Pivot system scattered and wrapped along power poles. Corn field stripped.
• Healthy tree uprooted. Pivot system destroyed.
• Power pole snapped at base and thrown to the west northwest. Several poles are down. Twisted pivots.
• Loss of roof on an older barn. The roof was deposited to the west southwest.

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

Thunderstorms developed over the central Sandhills in the vicinity of a stalled out frontal boundary. This activity quickly became severe with large hail up to golf ball size, severe thunderstorm wind gusts to 60 MPH and a tornado was reported over western Custer County. Severe thunderstorms also tracked across far southwestern Nebraska, impacting Chase and Hayes county. Hail up to 3 inches in diameter was reported in the Wauneta area.

Tornado touched down in the vicinity of Eureka Valley road and 15 road and traveled to the southeast for approximately 2 miles. Where the initial touchdown occurred, numerous power poles were snapped and a twisted a center pivot irrigation system occurred. Several large pieces of aluminum irrigation pipe were lofted and deposited. The tornado tracked east southeast, uprooting and damaging large trees near Dry Creek and Road 420.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 18:57 UTC and running to 02:00 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:58 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 North Platte radar (KLNX), 65 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:21 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 2024 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are

1 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.