EF2 tornado, Lemoyne to Lake Mc Conaghy, Nebraska, May 23, 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

May 23, 2024

Touchdown

5:39 PM MDT (23:39 UTC)

Lifted

5:42 PM MDT (23:42 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

0.3 miles (0.5 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$3.5 million

County

Keith County

Touchdown point

41.260, -101.780

Lift-off point

41.270, -101.770

Record number

2405231739-01

43 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LBF, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 125 mph.

• Camper 12 foot long slingshot by crossroads, rolled twice.
• Cottonwood tree branches downed.
• Multiple trees downed, either uproot or snapped at trunk. One has visible twisted damage. Cottonwood trees, facing north.
• Approximately 20 foot camper blown over. Tree damage nearby.

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 Nebraska Panhandle during the mid afternoon hours of May 23rd. As this activity moved east into better moisture and wind shear, storms became severe. Large hail, damaging winds, and tornadoes were reported.

Photo via social media confirms a tornado touchdown over Lake McConaughy approximately 1.4 miles southwest of Belmar. Time estimated by radar evidence.

A tornado developed over the North Shore neighborhood near Lazy Ike Road and traveled to the southeast. On building experienced complete roof loss and several large cottonwood trees were either uprooted or had top branches snapped off. One tree, approximately two feet in diameter, fell on a vehicle.

A tornado developed in open prairie east of North Shore, where a converging pattern of flattened grass was observed. The tornado traveled north across railroad tracks and flattened a fence line.

A brief, but significant, tornado developed in the Lakeview Subdivision and traveled to the northeast. Multiple dwellings suffered damage, including a large pole barn destroyed and single family homes with roof or exterior wall loss. Multiple trees were also downed.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

10 minutes of warning. NWS LBF issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:29 UTC, 10 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:04 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 20:25 UTC and running to 04:00 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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:50 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), 126 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:36 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

26 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.