EF1 tornado, Goodland to Virgil, Oklahoma, May 9, 2016

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 mphthis tornado

   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.

Rating

EF1

Date

May 9, 2016

Touchdown

7:02 PM CDT (00:02 UTC)

Lifted

7:10 PM CDT (00:10 UTC)

On the ground

8 minutes

Path length

6.1 miles (9.8 km)

Path width

650 yards (594 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$250,000

County

Choctaw County

Touchdown point

34.011, -95.570

Lift-off point

34.015, -95.465

Record number

1605091802-01

70 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.

• Approximate ending point of tornado witnessed by storm chasers and storm spotters
• Approximate beginning point of tornado witnessed by storm chasers and storm spotters

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

Severe thunderstorms developed along and ahead of a dry line across central Oklahoma during the afternoon of May 9th. The storms moved across eastern Oklahoma during the evening hours. Prior to the storms moving into the area, the atmosphere ahead of the dry line in eastern Oklahoma had become very unstable. This instability, combined with very strong wind shear associated with a strong trough of low pressure that moved into the Southern Plains from the Southern Rockies, resulted in the development of supercell thunderstorms. One of these supercells produced multiple tornadoes as it tracked along and near an outflow boundary from morning thunderstorms, which had settled across southeastern Oklahoma by the afternoon. One of the tornadoes was long-lived and damaging. In addition to the tornadoes in southeastern Oklahoma, the severe thunderstorms produced hail up to golfball size and damaging wind gusts across other portions of eastern Oklahoma.

This tornado developed west of Hugo and moved eastward across town. Numerous homes and businesses were damaged, storage buildings were destroyed, trees were uprooted, signs were blown down, and power poles were snapped. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in the tornado was 95 to 105 mph.

Several storm chasers and storm spotters observed this tornado, which remained over Lake Hugo for much of its life cycle. The NWS ground survey team investigated accessible areas of land on both the west and east sides of the lake, and could find no damage. Therefore, the specific details regarding this tornado had to be estimated, and a damage rating could not be determined.

Storm chasers and storm spotters observed this tornado, which developed during the life cycle of the Hugo Lake tornado from the same supercell updraft. This tornado was observed to be to the south of the other tornado. The NWS damage survey team could find no damage in the area where this tornado was suspected to be, as it was either over Lake Hugo or in the marsh land on the east side of the lake. Both areas were inaccessible, and therefore, no damage was known to exist from which a damage rating could be determined.

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

9 minutes of warning. NWS TSA issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:53 UTC, 9 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 19:38 UTC and running to 01:25 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:00 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.

Hugo (HHW), 3 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Western Arkansas radar (KSRX), 177 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:00 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 2016 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

27 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.