F3 tornado, Depew, Oklahoma, May 29, 2004

1. F040 to 72 mph

   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 mphthis tornado

   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

F3

Date

May 29, 2004

Touchdown

11:18 PM CDT (04:18 UTC)

Path length

7.5 miles (12.1 km)

Path width

700 yards (640 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$350,000

County

Creek County

Touchdown point

35.830, -96.600

Lift-off point

35.870, -96.470

Record number

982

A tornado moved from the west northwest of Depew to the north northeast of Depew. At its strongest it produced F3 damage. The F3 rating was based on a 20 foot section of a concrete anchored iron pipe cattle gate being removed from the ground and displaced 30 feet. The gate was anchored by 3 posts. All of the posts were set in 24 inches of concrete. Another tornado formed near and just after this tornado dissipated. The two tornadoes formed a nearly continuous damage path. The damage produced by the two tornadoes in western Creek County included 5 mobile homes destroyed, 2 houses destroyed, and 4 houses with significant roof damage. The path of the second tornado is described in a subsequent entry.

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

36 minutes of warning. NWS TSA issued a tornado warning for this county at 03:42 UTC, 36 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 04:45 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 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 01:02 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.

Chandler Municipal Airport (CQB), 29 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Norman radar (KTLX), 88 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:16 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 2004 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

77 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 78 of them

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.