EF4 Picher–Neosho tornado, Oklahoma and Missouri, May 10, 2008

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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF4

Date

May 10, 2008

Touchdown

5:20 PM CDT (22:20 UTC)

Lifted

6:55 PM CDT (23:55 UTC)

On the ground

95 minutes

Path length

75.5 miles (121.5 km)

Path width

1,760 yards (1609 m)

Deaths

21

Injuries

350

Property damage

$61 million

Counties

Craig, Ottawa, Newton and Barry counties

Touchdown point

36.998, -95.141

Lift-off point

36.818, -93.783

Record number

0805101620-01

Elevated severe thunderstorms containing large hail developed north of a warm front that was moving slowly northward across eastern Oklahoma and west central Arkansas during the morning and early afternoon of the 10th. ||Another round of severe thunderstorms developed late in the afternoon as a dry line approached the area from the west. Extreme instability and strong vertical wind shear resulted in the development of long-lived supercell thunderstorms that moved across eastern Oklahoma and northwestern Arkansas during the late afternoon and evening. Several of these supercells became tornadic and a few produced long-lived damaging tornadoes. ||One such supercell developed and moved along the Oklahoma-Kansas border and then into southwestern Missouri. This storm produced a tornado in northeastern Craig County OK that remained on the ground for 29 miles in Oklahoma, continued for about 31 miles in Newton County MO, and finally dissipated about 15 miles into Barry County MO. It produced EF-4 damage in several locations, including Picher, a small town in north-central Ottawa County OK. Twenty-one fatalities, over 350 injuries, and an estimated $60 million in property damage resulted from this tornado in Oklahoma and Missouri. Six of the fatalities and about 150 injuries occurred in Picher OK.||Other strong tornadoes developed and moved across portions of Pittsburg and Latimer Counties. A EF-2 tornado was on the ground for about eight miles west of McAlester, damaging numerous homes in its path. Another EF-2 tornado developed southwest of Hartshorne in Pittsburg County and moved 19 miles before dissipating just east of Yanush in Latimer County. Four injuries resulted from that tornado and numerous homes were severely damaged or destroyed.

Three tornadoes were spawned from supercell thunderstorms that developed over southeast Kansas. These storms quickly moved into southwest Missouri causing devestating damage to homes, businesses, and trees in Newton, Barry, and Jasper counties. One tornado, with an intensity that ranged from EF-4 to EF-1, killed 15 people as it tracked through Newton and Barry counties, while another tornado killed one person in Jasper County.

This tornado developed at 1620 cst in northeastern Craig County and continued into Ottawa County. The tornado moved rapidly eastward toward the town of Picher where it destroyed about 200 homes, killed six people, and injured another 150 people at about 540 pm. Damage in and around Picher was rated EF-4 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale. ||The tornado began moving more southeasterly near Picher and struck the north side of Quapaw. While this tornado was beginning to weaken east of Quapaw, the supercell produced another tornado a few miles east-northeast of Quapaw that merged with this tornado just east of I-44. After the merger of the two tornadoes, a single tornadic circulation reintensified and became about a mile wide for several miles before moving into Newton County MO.

This tornado is an extension of the Ottawa County, Oklahoma tornado. A National Weather Service storm survey revealed that an EF-4 tornado crossed into Missouri just north of Iris Road, and tracked east southeast all the way across Newton County to just north of Fairview. Several people were killed in automobiles, including a firefighter who was storm spotting, as the tornado briefly reached EF4 intensity near the intersection of Highway 43 and Iris Road. One vehicle at this location was thrown 5/8s of a mile. The tornado then extended to a mile wide and EF3 intensity as it tracked across the intersection of Highway 86 and BB. Many of the 14 fatalities and 200 injuries occurred from just west of Highway 43 to Highway 86. The communities of Granby and Newtonia were also directly impacted from this tornado.

The deaths

20 direct deaths are recorded for this tornado, each with what Storm Data knows of it.

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 tornado watch, issued at 16:43 UTC and running to 23:20 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 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:09 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.

Joplin (JLN), 27 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Springfield radar (KSGF), 101 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:17 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 2008 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

36 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.