EF2 tornado, Broken Arrow to Oneta, Oklahoma, May 30, 2013

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 mphthis tornado

   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.

Rating

EF2

Date

May 30, 2013

Touchdown

8:40 PM CDT (01:40 UTC)

Lifted

8:54 PM CDT (01:54 UTC)

On the ground

14 minutes

Path length

5.6 miles (9.0 km)

Path width

450 yards (411 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$3.0 million

Counties

Tulsa and Wagoner counties

Touchdown point

36.022, -95.773

Lift-off point

36.040, -95.678

Record number

1305301940-01

37 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TSA, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 132 mph.

• Second story of home destroyed
• house built with wind reinforcement clips and still showed some separation from walls; a couple interior walls were shifted
• along with damage to house, several nearby large trees were snapped
• Building had roof purlins beginning to show signs of failure; a lot of wall and roof panels blown off; bay doors blown in/out

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

A complex of storms that had been over portions of eastern Oklahoma during the early morning hours intensified during the late morning and afternoon resulting in isolated reports of large hail and damaging wind. A much more widespread severe weather event occurred later in the day as severe thunderstorms redeveloped across central and eastern Oklahoma during the afternoon hours ahead of a dry line over central Oklahoma and along an outflow boundary across northeastern Oklahoma. The storms produced large hail and damaging wind. A bow echo type of storm produced a brief tornado in northern Creek County during the afternoon. Two supercell thunderstorms moved along the outflow boundary from the morning thunderstorms and produced several tornadoes during the evening. One storm produced several tornadoes across Mayes County and the other produced a damaging tornado in Broken Arrow.

This is the first of two segments for this tornado. This tornado developed south of E 96th Street South and west of S 16th Street where it damaged roofs of homes, snapped or uprooted large trees, and destroyed barns as it moved northeast. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in this segment of the tornado was 100 to 110 mph. The tornado continued into Wagoner County, crossing County Line Road near E 94th Street South.

This is the second and final segment of this tornado. As the tornado crossed into Wagoner County south of E 91st Street South it blew down trees and damaged barns. Roofs of homes were damaged as it crossed E 91st Street South near S 199th E Avenue, where it also snapped trees and damaged barns. The tornado turned more east crossing open fields and the Muskogee Turnpike. A gas station, several metal buildings, and a small wood-framed building was damaged as it crossed Highway 51. ||The tornado appeared to intensify as it approached and crossed S 225th E Avenue where several homes were severely damaged. The most pronounced damage followed as the tornado moved into a subdivision north of E 91st Street South, where the second floor of one home was destroyed. Several other homes in this neighborhood sustained major damage to their roofs and exterior walls. The tornado continued to move eastward, crossing the Muskogee Turnpike where it snapped numerous large trees. Two school buildings lost a number of windows as the tornado approached S 257th E Avenue. A home was damaged and a large outbuilding was destroyed in this area. Trees were snapped along and near Joy Avenue before the tornado dissipated.||Maximum estimated wind in this segment of this tornado based on this damage was 125 to 135 mph.

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

2 minutes of warning. NWS TSA issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:38 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:51 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 18:21 UTC and running to 02:44 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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. 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.

Tulsa/Lloyd Jones (RVS), 23 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Tulsa radar (KINX), 22 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:41 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 2013 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

28 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.