EF0 tornado, Tuttle to Dibble, Oklahoma, May 11, 2023

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.

Rating

EF0

Date

May 11, 2023

Touchdown

7:36 PM CDT (00:36 UTC)

Lifted

7:38 PM CDT (00:38 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.4 miles (0.6 km)

Path width

30 yards (27 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$4,000

Counties

Grady and McClain counties

Touchdown point

35.203, -97.675

Lift-off point

35.203, -97.675

Record number

2305111836-01

45 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS OUN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

• Green feeder in bg came from foreground blown 100 yards east damaging sprayer and fence
• Also tree damage in tree line just west
• Tin caught in east side of fence line.
• Also loss of some barn panels west.

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

A deepening upper/low pressure system slowly approached portions of the Central Plains on the 11th. Combined with increasing instability and wind shear, a favorable environment for severe weather (capable of producing all severe hazards) developed across much of western into central Oklahoma on the evening of the 11th. Numerous supercell thunderstorms developed and produced twelve tornadoes and large hail across portions of these areas.

Media and other storm chasers observed a tornado that moved north-northeast from about 4 miles south of Tuttle to about 2 miles southeast of Tuttle. No significant damage was reported in this area, and the specific path was estimated.

A tornado was observed by storm chasers touching down near the Grady-McClain County line. An NWS storm survey team found tree damage and damage to a barn along County Road 1250 just west of the McClain County line. The tornado moved north-northeast and crossed into McClain County just north of County Road 1250.

This tornado moved into McClain County from Grady County. An unanchored shed was blown over and rolled just inside the McClain County line before the tornado dissipated.

A few minutes after the tornado near the Grady-McClain County line dissipated, another tornado was observed to develop moving from just south of the intersection of State Highway 76 and the H.E. Bailey Turnpike Spur in far northern Blanchard, east-northeast into the southwest edge of Newcastle. At least two homes suffered damage to shingles, and a few trees were damaged along path.

Storm chasers reported a tornado that touched down in Grady County to the southwest of Dibble. Some tree damage was observed on County Street 2980.

Tree damage was noted along 220th Street to the west of Dibble by a tornado.

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

23 minutes of warning. NWS OUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:13 UTC, 23 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 20:46 UTC and running to 05:36 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, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. 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 Norman radar (KTLX), 39 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:35 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 2023 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

32 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.