Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 1974

F1 tornado, Carson and Hutchinson counties, Texas, April 19, 1974

This F1 tornado ran 1.9 miles across Carson and Hutchinson counties on April 19, 1974, touching down at 4:35 PM CDT and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 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.

The record

Rating
F1
Date
April 19, 1974
Touchdown
4:35 PM CDT (21:35 UTC)
Path length
1.9 miles (3.1 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Counties
Carson and Hutchinson counties
Touchdown point
35.600, -101.280
Lift-off point
35.620, -101.250
Record number
299

The air that afternoon

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.

Amarillo Airport, TX (KAMA), 12:00Z

9.6 hours before the tornado, 58 km from the path. April 19, 1974.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Amarillo Airport, TX at 12:00Z on 1974-04-19Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 495 joules per kilogram, CIN -253, lifted condensation level 1271 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Amarillo Airport, TX at 12:00Z on 1974-04-19The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 15 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 8 knots.193958Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
495 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-253 J/kg
Surface CAPE
38 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1271 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
8 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
15 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
103 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.4
0-3 km lapse rate
5.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Amarillo Airport, TX (KAMA), 00:00Z

2.4 hours after it, 58 km from the path. April 20, 1974.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Amarillo Airport, TX at 00:00Z on 1974-04-20Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1180 joules per kilogram, CIN -30, lifted condensation level 1844 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Amarillo Airport, TX at 00:00Z on 1974-04-20The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 84 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 34 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
1180 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-30 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1717 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1844 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
34 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
84 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
152 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.1
Supercell composite
3.1
0-3 km lapse rate
8.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Amarillo - Rick Husband Intl (AMA), 59 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
20:00 UTC7653180° 21 kt331002
20:23 UTC180° 17 kt1006.1+TSRA
21:00 UTC7359180° 23 kt321000.7
22:00 UTC7355170° 31 kt37999.3
23:00 UTC7354200° 25 kt45998.6

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1974 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 19, 1974

6 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 195:45 PM CDTF1Republic, KS13.917$500 to $5,000
April 195:50 PM CDTF1Cloud, KS0.117$500 to $5,000
April 197:00 PM MDTF1Hooker, NE0.110$5,000 to $50,000
April 198:15 PM CDTF1Logan, NE0.110$500 to $5,000
April 198:20 PM CDTF2Roberts, TX5.930
April 198:50 PM CDTF0Phelps, NE0.110$5,000 to $50,000

What this means

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.

Sources

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.