EF3 tornado, Arnett to Woodward, Oklahoma, April 14, 2012

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 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. 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

EF3

Date

April 14, 2012

Touchdown

11:42 PM CDT (04:42 UTC)

Lifted

12:27 AM CDT (05:27 UTC)

On the ground

45 minutes

Path length

34.0 miles (54.7 km)

Path width

400 yards (366 m)

Deaths

6

Injuries

29

Counties

Ellis and Woodward counties

Touchdown point

36.113, -99.784

Lift-off point

36.488, -99.390

Record number

1204142242-01

87 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS OUN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF3. The highest wind the damage implies is 165 mph.

• Walls barely nailed to foundation.
• Most walls collapsed but weaker than standard construction (1X3 stud walls) in this neighborhood.
• Closeup view of stemwall and the almost no impression left by a shot nail.
• Viewing west at the carpet store, collapsed tilt-up concrete panels on south and east ends, collapsed CMU wall with metal pole beams bent on west side.

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

A severe weather outbreak occurred on the afternoon and evening of Saturday April 14th, 2012 across Kansas and northwest Oklahoma. Multiple tornadoes, including a few that were strong, very large hail and damaging winds accompanied the supercells that formed through the afternoon and evening. Over a dozen tornadoes occurred in northwest Oklahoma in addition to the numerous tornadoes in Kansas.||Much of Oklahoma remained under clear skies for the afternoon, which coupled with plentiful moisture allowed very strong instability to develop. A dryline stretched from western Kansas into northwest and western Oklahoma through the afternoon hours. Thunderstorms ignited off the dryline in the early afternoon, with the first severe weather reports around 230pm. The first tornado was not reported until nearly 4pm as low level wind shear increased gradually. The tornado reports continued through nearly 1am with the tornado that impacted Woodward, OK the last tornado of the evening.||With the first supercells firing around 2 PM, many dropped large hail, some as large as 3 inches in diameter. Many brief tornado touchdowns were reported as well, with the initial reports north of Woodward, OK. Additional supercells developed through the afternoon with a prominent tornadic supercell developing near Waynoka, Oklahoma. This supercell produced multiple tornadoes near Cherokee and continued moving to the northeast. One tornado with this supercell produced damage to a cemetery west of Byron. Fortunately, many of the tornadoes from this thunderstorm remained over mainly rural areas in Waynoka, Woods and Alfalfa counties.||Another tornadic supercell developed southwest of Woodward before midnight and tracked toward Woodward. The Woodward tornado began around 1150 PM roughly 3 miles northeast of Arnett and moved northeast into Woodward county. The southwest city limits of Woodward were impacted near 1218 AM on Sunday April 15th, 2012 and the tornado finally exited the north-northwest side of Woodward around 1223 AM. The tornado dissipated shortly afterward, 4 miles north of Woodward. Sadly, 6 fatalities were reported with the tornado that impacted Woodward.

The tornado developed south of Arnett and moved northeast. Two homes were categorized as destroyed and a few other homes sustained damage. Trees and power lines were also damaged as the tornado moved toward the Woodward county border. The tornado eventually crossed the border, doing substantially more damage towards Woodward.

The tornado developed approximately just south of Arnett (Ellis County) at 11:42 pm CDT on April 14, 2012 and moved northeast. Only minor damage, downed trees and power poles/lines, was seen as the tornado moved over mainly rural portions of Woodward County, southwest of the city of Woodward. At approximately 12:12 am CDT on April 15, 2012, the tornado struck two mobile homes 5 miles southwest of Woodward. The damage here was determined to be EF-2 in intensity, and also resulted in 3 fatalities. The heaviest damage, rated EF-3, was reported as the tornado entered the southwest sides of Woodward around 12:18 am CDT. Several homes and businesses were heavily damaged as the tornado continued northeast.|Several more mobile homes were destroyed by the tornado on the north side of Woodward, and resulted in 3 additional fatalities. The tornado finally exited the city of Woodward at approximately 12:23 am CDT, eventually dissipating approximately 4 miles north of Woodward at 12:27 am CDT.

The deaths

6 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 22:29 UTC and running to 06:59 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 01:00 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 Vance AFB radar (KVNX), 139 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 04:41 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 2012 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

83 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 84 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.