Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2007
EF1 tornado, Granbury, Texas, April 24, 2007
This EF1 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Hood County on April 24, 2007, touching down at 2:00 PM CDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $200,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- EF1
- Date
- April 24, 2007
- Touchdown
- 2:00 PM CDT (19:00 UTC)
- Lifted
- 2:02 PM CDT (19:02 UTC)
- On the ground
- 2 minutes
- Path length
- 0.5 miles (0.8 km)
- Path width
- 50 yards (46 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $200,000
- County
- Hood County
- Touchdown point
- 32.384, -97.610
- Lift-off point
- 32.389, -97.626
- Record number
- 0704241300-01
What the Weather Service recorded
Low level moisture was in place across North Texas as an upper level low pressure system moved into the western half of the state. Large hail reports along with damaging winds and flash flooding were common throughout this twelve-hour event.
A tornado moved through the community of Pecan Plantation, causing damage to trees, tree limbs, roofs, windows, playground sets, and fences. The most significant damage occurred to a brick home on the north side of Equestrian Drive. Portions of the roof were removed, a tree in the front yard was uprooted, the garage door was blown in, and windows were broken. Wind speeds were estimated at 95-100 MPH.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
14 minutes of warning. NWS FWD issued a tornado warning for this county at 18:46 UTC, 14 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 19:30 UTC.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 16:49 UTC and running to 02:46 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 16:49 UTC | 02:46 UTC | Tornado Watch | FWD |
| 18:46 UTC | 19:30 UTC | Tornado Warning | FWD |
| 01:57 UTC | 02:45 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | FWD |
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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 17:01 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
7.0 hours before the tornado, 58 km from the path. April 24, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 819 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -306 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 892 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 685 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 30 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 34 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 192 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 177 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- -0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.3 K/km
Fort Worth, TX (KFWD), 00:00Z
5.0 hours after it, 58 km from the path. April 25, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1510 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -21 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1780 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 701 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 31 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 154 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 126 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 1.0
- Supercell composite
- 5.2
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.3 K/km
The radar
The Dallas/Ft Worth radar (KFWS), 36 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:57 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.
What was reported nearby
Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18:45 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Glen Rose | Somervell, TX | LARGE TREE DOWN IN GLEN ROSE AT PARK |
| 18:52 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 11 Ese Granbury | Johnson, TX | ROOF DAMAGE TO A HOUSE EAST OF PECAN PLANTATION |
| 19:16 UTC | TORNADO | Godley | Johnson, TX | TORNADO ON GROUND NEAR GODLEY |
| 19:50 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | 2 N Fort Worth | Tarrant, TX | 2 FT WATER ON PAFFORD ST NEAR I-35 |
| 20:50 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | Fort Worth | Tarrant, TX | 2 FEET OF WATER OVER ROAD AT BERRY STREET AND MCCART STREET NEAR TCU |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2007 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of April 24, 2007
22 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 24 | 11:58 AM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 0.5 | 10 | $25,000 | ||
| April 24 | 12:15 PM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 4.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 12:38 PM MDT | EF0 | Lincoln, CO | 2.0 | 50 | |||
| April 24 | 12:58 PM MDT | EF0 | Lincoln, CO | 0.1 | 50 | |||
| April 24 | 2:20 PM CDT | EF0 | Denton, TX | 1.0 | 50 | $40,000 | ||
| April 24 | 1:26 PM MDT | EF1 | Cheyenne, CO | 4.5 | 25 | $1,000 | ||
| April 24 | 1:37 PM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 4.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 1:48 PM MDT | EF0 | Wallace, KS | 0.5 | 10 | |||
| April 24 | 1:55 PM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 5.0 | 50 | |||
| April 24 | 2:00 PM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 0.5 | 10 | |||
| April 24 | 2:00 PM MDT | EF0 | Cheyenne, CO | 0.5 | 10 | |||
| April 24 | 3:27 PM CDT | EF0 | Osage, OK | 5.5 | 100 | |||
| April 24 | 6:20 PM CDT | EF0 | Barton, MO | 2.8 | 25 | $5,000 | ||
| April 24 | 7:01 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:01 PM CDT | EF3 | Maverick, TX | 4.0 | 400 | 7 | $80 million | |
| April 24 | 7:09 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:12 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:14 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:16 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:19 PM CDT | EF1 | Denton, TX | 2.5 | 50 | $100,000 | ||
| April 24 | 7:29 PM CDT | EF0 | Reno, KS | 0.0 | 25 | |||
| April 24 | 7:43 PM CDT | EF1 | Franklin, AR | 1.0 | 100 | $125,000 |
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.