Tornadoes · United States · Oklahoma · 2013

EF0 tornado, Kingston, Oklahoma, July 26, 2013

This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Marshall County on July 26, 2013, touching down at 3:25 PM CDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    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. 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.

The record

Rating
EF0
Date
July 26, 2013
Touchdown
3:25 PM CDT (20:25 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Marshall County
Touchdown point
33.943, -96.731
Lift-off point
33.943, -96.731
Record number
1307261425-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Storms developed across portions of southeastern Oklahoma on the afternoon of the 26th. Although the storms generally remained below severe limits, one storm briefly produced a tornado near Lake Texoma.

KXII-TV received two public reports and a photograph of a tornado that was observed to briefly touch down from the Enos area of Marshall County near Lake Texoma. The time and the location of this tornado are estimated and no damage is known to have occurred.

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

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
08:08 UTC15:31 UTCFlash Flood WatchOUN
20:40 UTC22:46 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WatchOUN

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 forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:01 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 air that afternoon

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.

Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), 12:00Z

8.4 hours before the tornado, 134 km from the path. July 26, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Fort Worth, TX at 12:00Z on 2013-07-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 626 joules per kilogram, CIN -169, lifted condensation level 1436 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Fort Worth, TX at 12:00Z on 2013-07-26The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 104 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 36 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
626 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-169 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1905 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1436 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
36 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
104 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
137 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
1.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), 00:00Z

3.6 hours after it, 134 km from the path. July 27, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Fort Worth, TX at 00:00Z on 2013-07-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 881 joules per kilogram, CIN -11, lifted condensation level 1806 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Fort Worth, TX at 00:00Z on 2013-07-27The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity -9 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 34 knots.193958Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
881 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-11 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1920 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1806 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
34 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-9 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
78 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
-0.0
Supercell composite
-0.4
0-3 km lapse rate
7.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Dallas/Ft Worth radar (KFWS), 161 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:23 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2013 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of July 26, 2013

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
July 265:50 PM CDTEF0Lafayette, MO0.125$750

What this means

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.

Sources

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.