EF0 tornado, Flying H Ranch, New Mexico, September 15, 2016

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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 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

EF0

Date

September 15, 2016

Touchdown

2:10 PM MDT (20:10 UTC)

Lifted

2:30 PM MDT (20:30 UTC)

On the ground

20 minutes

Path length

4.7 miles (7.6 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Chaves County

Touchdown point

32.896, -105.069

Lift-off point

32.880, -104.990

Record number

1609151410-01

The upper level trough responsible for severe weather across the area on the 14th continued to impact New Mexico through the 15th. Abundant moisture and instability associated with southeasterly upslope flow and strong upper level dynamics generated an extended period of severe weather across the eastern plains. Severe thunderstorms from late on the 14th persisted past midnight before diminishing before sunrise. A powerful storm that moved south of Melrose just after midnight produced one of the best radar signatures of a tornado forecasters have ever observed in eastern New Mexico. A nearby resident reported a loud roaring sound in the distance. A persistent storm with torrential rainfall amounts over four inches in eastern San Miguel County produced flash flooding along Atarque Creek through sunrise. Storms fired up quickly again by late morning and moved east across the plains. A funnel cloud was observed just after the noon hour near Vaughn. Another storm that moved east across Lincoln County dumped nickel to quarter size hail in the area around Tinnie, Picacho, and Dunken. A tornado and golf ball size hail was then spotted from this storm over rural ranch lands to the northeast of Dunken. Many other storms that impacted eastern New Mexico generated hail, torrential rainfall, and gusty winds throughout the afternoon.

Public reported a tornado on the ground just north of U.S. Highway 82 near Picacho Road. No damage observed.

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

18 minutes of warning. NWS ABQ issued a tornado warning for this county at 19:52 UTC, 18 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 20:15 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 18:45 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:49 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 Holloman AFB radar (KHDX), 104 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:11 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 2016 tornado in New MexicoEvery tornado in New Mexico since 1950Warnings in force in New Mexico nowThe forecast where you are

4 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.