Unrated tornado, Appleby, South Dakota, February 24, 2025

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 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. Unratedthis tornado

   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

Unrated

Date

February 24, 2025

Touchdown

4:11 PM CST (22:11 UTC)

Path length

0.0 miles (0.0 km)

Path width

5 yards (5 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Codington County

Touchdown point

44.815, -97.078

Lift-off point

44.815, -97.078

Record number

2502241611-01

A fast-moving low pressure system brought thunderstorms in the relatively warmer air ahead of it, along with strong non-thunderstorm winds in the colder air behind it. The strong non-thunderstorm winds developed during the morning across central and north central South Dakota and peaked in the afternoon hours of February 24th. Several South Dakota Department of Transportation weather stations recorded gusts in excess of 60 mph, including a 64 mph wind gusts 13 miles north-northwest of Sansarc, and 62 mph recorded winds 4 miles west-northwest of Cresbard, 1 mile north of Ree Heights, and 3 miles southeast of Reliance. Numerous other locations reported wind gusts between 50 and 60 mph.||Later that afternoon and evening, unusual February thunderstorms developed over eastern South Dakota. While the environment wasn���t favorable for strong storms, there was enough low-level rotation in the atmosphere to support a brief, weak tornado in Codington County. Some storms also produced pea-sized hail. This event was particularly notable, as it marked the first documented tornado in South Dakota history during the month of February.

A weak thunderstorm generated a brief tornado in an open field. A storm chaser photographed the event. No damage was observed by this tornado, but it was the first February tornado to be documented in South Dakota history.

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

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

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:44 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 Aberdeen radar (KABR), 127 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:10 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 2025 tornado in South DakotaEvery tornado in South Dakota since 1950Warnings in force in South Dakota nowThe forecast where you are

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.