EF1 tornado, Hatton to Hatton Arpt, North Dakota, August 8, 2025

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

August 8, 2025

Touchdown

3:47 AM CDT (08:47 UTC)

Lifted

3:53 AM CDT (08:53 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

3.9 miles (6.3 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Traill County

Touchdown point

47.627, -97.396

Lift-off point

47.663, -97.329

Record number

2508080247-02

30 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FGF, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EFU. The highest wind the damage implies is 104 mph.

• Several consecutive tree trunks snapped in the within the shelterbelt.
• Shelterbelt with several trunks snapped off.
• Satellite showed tornadic wind signature in wheat field.
• Shelterbelt tree damage with multiple trees snapped and large branches down.

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

A QLCS type mesoscale convective system brought widespread severe thunderstorm winds to eastern ND, along with, multiple brief tornadoes during the early morning hours.

This tornado developed about 2.8 miles east of Hatton and tracked northeast. It damaged a farmstead where the garage door of large shed was torn off, a tree was uprooted, and numerous large branches were broken. Numerous large tree branches snapped and uprooted along path as it tracked northeast crossed multiple shelterbelts. Time estimated from KVX radar. TDS observed on radar. Sentinel-2 high resolution satellite imagery reveals crop damage along the path. Maximum wind speed is estimated at 104 mph based on the tree damage.

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 04:57 UTC and running to 11:52 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 06:00 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 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 Fargo/Grand Forks radar (KMVX), 13 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 08:44 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 2025 tornado in North DakotaEvery tornado in North Dakota since 1950Warnings in force in North Dakota nowThe forecast where you are

13 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.