F0 tornado, Red Oak, Oklahoma, November 9, 1998

1. F040 to 72 mphthis tornado

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. F173 to 112 mph

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

3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. F4207 to 260 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. F5261 to 318 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

F0

Date

November 9, 1998

Touchdown

11:55 PM CST (05:55 UTC)

Path length

0.5 miles (0.8 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$10,000

County

Latimer County

Touchdown point

34.980, -95.030

Lift-off point

34.980, -95.030

Record number

451

Summary of events for November 9-10 1998:A solid north-south line of severe thunderstorms raced across all of eastern Oklahoma on the evening of November 9. This was in association with the cold front trailing from a powerful "Colorado low" moving across the central plains. This narrow line of storms produced strong to severe wind gusts along its entire length, with gusts estimated as high as 80 mph. There were also reports of hail as large as quarters.Late in the evening, a portion of the line in southeast Oklahoma bowed out once it passed McAlester, producing more severe wind damage and funnel clouds from eastern Pittsburg County to the Arkansas state line. A tornado touched down southwest of Fort Smith between Arkoma and Pocola, travelling northeast for 5 miles across the southern part of Fort Smith.

An F0 tornado destroyed a barn, blew shingles off roofs, and downed numerous trees/power poles near Boggy.

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

35 minutes of warning. NWS TSA issued a tornado warning for this county at 05:20 UTC, 35 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 06:00 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 Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 10:59 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.

Mc Alester Regional (MLC), 70 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Western Arkansas radar (KSRX), 70 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:56 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 1998 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma 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.