EF2 tornado, Prue to Prattville, Oklahoma, March 25, 2015

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

March 25, 2015

Touchdown

5:21 PM CDT (22:21 UTC)

Lifted

5:38 PM CDT (22:38 UTC)

On the ground

17 minutes

Path length

11.1 miles (17.9 km)

Path width

800 yards (732 m)

Deaths

1

Injuries

30

Property damage

$2.1 million

Counties

Tulsa, Pawnee and Osage counties

Touchdown point

36.183, -96.302

Lift-off point

36.133, -96.117

Record number

1503251621-01

66 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.

• church west roof damaged; east wall collapsed
• lots of tree damage this area
• numerous homes with shingle damage this area
• several trees uprooted, minor roof damage to home

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

Severe thunderstorms developed during the afternoon hours to the east of a surface low pressure system located over southwestern Oklahoma and near a stationary frontal boundary that was draped across northeastern Oklahoma. Several of these storms developed supercell characteristics due to a very unstable air mass that was in place over the region coupled with strong vertical wind shear. These supercells produced several tornadoes, including a strong tornado that resulted in a fatality in Sand Springs. The storms also produced hail up to softball size and wind gusts to around 90 mph. ||The storms evolved into a line during the evening hours and moved swiftly across eastern Oklahoma producing wind damage and hail to golfball size. ||Locally heavy rainfall as a result of storms moving repeatedly across the same locations resulted in flash flooding. Two flash flood fatalities occurred in Muskogee County when a vehicle was driven into flood waters and was swept off the road.

This is the second segment of a three segment tornado. The tornado crossed into Osage County over Keystone Lake and quickly crossed Highway 412. It then moved through a wooded area that was inaccessible by road. The first damage that was accessible by the survey team was at S 209th W Avenue, where the tornado damaged a church, snapped large tree limbs, and damaged a home. It moved east-southeast toward W Archer Road snapping or uprooting trees and damaging homes. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in this segment of the tornado was 95 to 105 mph. The tornado continued into Tulsa County, Oklahoma.

This is the third segment of a three segment tornado. The tornado moved into Tulsa County at W Archer Road to the east of S 209th W Avenue. The roofs of several homes were damaged and trees were uprooted as it crossed S 193rd W Avenue. The tornado moved southeast crossing Highway 412, where it snapped or uprooted numerous trees and blew a tractor trailer off the road. A doughnut shop was destroyed at S 177th W Avenue, homes were damaged, and trees and poles were snapped. It crossed the Arkansas River and moved through the River Oaks Estates Mobile Home Park where it destroyed 58 mobile homes and two permanent homes. One fatality and about 30 injuries occurred in this park. The tornado crossed the Arkansas River again as it moved east-southeast toward Sand Springs, uprooting numerous trees before dissipating on the south side of Sand Springs, south of Highway 412 and just west of Highway 97. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in this segment of the tornado was 125 to 135 mph.

The deaths

1 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.

8 minutes of warning. NWS TSA issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:13 UTC, 8 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:45 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 19:17 UTC and running to 01:20 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:53 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 Tulsa radar (KINX), 58 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:19 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 2015 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

9 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.