Unrated tornado, Des Lacs, North Dakota, June 7, 2026

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 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. Unratedthis tornado

   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, as surveyed

Unrated, preliminary

Date

June 7, 2026

Touchdown

9:37 PM CDT (02:37 UTC)

Lifted

9:40 PM CDT (02:40 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

0.5 miles (0.8 km)

Path width

0 yards (0 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Ward County

Touchdown point

48.169, -101.749

Lift-off point

48.175, -101.743

Surveyed by

NWS BIS

The office's name for it

Berthold

Survey last edited

June 8, 2026

Record number

None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

Estimated location and path of tornado. A white rope tornado came down and was on the ground for about 3 minutes... kicking up dust. No damage reported so EF-Unknown rating assigned.

Written by NWS BIS in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

1 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS BIS, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EFU.

• Estimated location of tornado. A white rope tornado came down and was on the ground for about 3 minutes... kicking up dust.

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

An upper level low and surface cold front combined with a very unstable airmass resulted in severe thunderstorms across western and central North Dakota. Supercell thunderstorms initially produced very large hail before transitioning to a linear storm mode, which led to widespread significant thunderstorm wind gusts. The largest reported hail was 3 inches in diameter, occurring southwest of Medora in Billings County. Measured wind gusts of 60 to 80 mph were common as storms moved across western and central North Dakota. The area with the most significant wind damage occurred across Stark, Morton, Mercer, and McLean Counties. In a swath from Dickinson, to Hebron, to Beulah, to Douglas Bay, to west of Garrison, damage from thunderstorm wind gusts led to winds estimated from 80 to 100 mph. The strongest measured wind gust came from a personal weather station just east of Beulah that reported a gust of 103 mph. Damage included campers turned over, large trees downed, roof damage, power outages, garages destroyed, vehicle damage, siding damage, and dented grain bins.

A white rope tornado came down south of Berthold and was on the ground for about 3 minutes, kicking up dust in a field. There were no structures impacted from this tornado and no damage to evaluate. By National Weather Service policy the tornado is rated EF-U (Unknown).

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 20:59 UTC and running to 04:30 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:00 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.

Juliet (1JN), 29 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Minot AFB radar (KMBX), 70 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:34 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 2026 tornado in North DakotaEvery tornado in North Dakota since 1950Warnings in force in North Dakota nowThe forecast where you are

6 more have been surveyed in the United States that day, so far.

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.