Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 1998

F1 tornado, Bellevue, Texas, April 26, 1998

This F1 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Clay County on April 26, 1998, touching down at 5:35 PM CDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 2, and did $50,000 of property damage.

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 26, 1998
Touchdown
5:35 PM CDT (22:35 UTC)
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
2
Property damage
$50,000
County
Clay County
Touchdown point
33.630, -98.020
Lift-off point
33.630, -98.020
Record number
506

What the Weather Service recorded

A tornado, probably a gustnado, overturned a mobile home on FM 1288 on the southwest side of Bellevue. A man and woman were injured inside the trailer and were taken to local hospitals. Tree limbs up to 8 inches in diameter were blown down and roofs were damaged on several homes. Two barns in the area were also destroyed.

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

The warnings

8 minutes of warning. NWS OUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:27 UTC, 8 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:00 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
17:03 UTC18:05 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningOUN
21:45 UTC22:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningOUN
22:27 UTC23:00 UTCTornado WarningOUN

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 forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 10:54 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 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.

Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), 12:00Z

10.6 hours before the tornado, 112 km from the path. April 26, 1998.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Fort Worth, TX at 12:00Z on 1998-04-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 177 joules per kilogram, CIN -328, lifted condensation level 676 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, Fort Worth, TX at 12:00Z on 1998-04-26The 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 146 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 knots.1939587897117136Sfc1 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
177 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-328 J/kg
Surface CAPE
111 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
676 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
146 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
7 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), 00:00Z

1.4 hours after it, 112 km from the path. April 27, 1998.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Fort Worth, TX at 00:00Z on 1998-04-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 799 joules per kilogram, CIN -3, lifted condensation level 602 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, Fort Worth, TX at 00:00Z on 1998-04-27The 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 153 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 44 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
799 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-3 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1099 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
602 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
44 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
153 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
177 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.6
Supercell composite
3.9
0-3 km lapse rate
5.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Wichita Falls/Shep (SPS), 58 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
20:56 UTC595720° 28 kt351005.4RA BR
21:44 UTC5957.250° 12 kt1006.8
21:56 UTC595710° 16 kt191005.8TSRA BR
22:23 UTC5957.280° 14 kt1005.1
22:56 UTC595830° 14 kt1006.1-TSRA BR
23:43 UTC57.257.2310° 10 kt1008.5
23:56 UTC5857 3 kt1007.8TSRA BR
00:11 UTC57.257.220° 21 kt251006.4

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1998 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 26, 1998

9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 261:30 AM CDTF1Saline, AR16.5150
April 262:20 PM CDTF0Castro, TX0.130$10,000
April 262:25 PM CDTF2Hale, TX0.330$100,000
April 263:40 PM CDTF0Crosby, TX0.130
April 264:14 PM CDTF0Shackelford, TX0.130
April 264:49 PM CDTF0Shackelford, TX0.130$2,000
April 265:29 PM CDTF0Haskell, TX0.130
April 265:55 PM CDTF0Coryell, TX0.130
April 266:45 PM CDTF0Coryell, TX0.130

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.