Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2007

EF0 tornado, Decatur, Texas, June 25, 2007

This EF0 tornado ran 4.0 miles across Wise County on June 25, 2007, touching down at 12:15 AM CDT and reaching 40 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 5, and did $50,000 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.

  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.

The record

Rating
EF0
Date
June 25, 2007
Touchdown
12:15 AM CDT (05:15 UTC)
Lifted
12:25 AM CDT (05:25 UTC)
On the ground
10 minutes
Path length
4.0 miles (6.4 km)
Path width
40 yards (37 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
5
Property damage
$50,000
County
Wise County
Touchdown point
33.271, -97.551
Lift-off point
33.312, -97.502
Record number
0706252315-01

What the Weather Service recorded

An upper low remained over the area triggering several rounds of showers and thunderstorms. A very moist environment encouraged flash flooding.

A tornado touched down near Highway 51 and caused damage in the Quail Run subdivision. A mobile home was moved from its underpinning and had its windows blown out, and two residential roofs, sheds, and a trampoline were damaged two miles north of Highway 380 near the Wise/Denton County line. Several people suffered minor injuries.

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

The warnings

21 minutes of warning. NWS FWD issued a tornado warning for this county at 04:54 UTC, 21 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 05:45 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
22:21 UTC02:15 UTCFlash Flood WarningFWD
04:54 UTC05:45 UTCTornado WarningFWD
05:22 UTC08:15 UTCFlash Flood WarningFWD
19:33 UTC22:30 UTCFlash Flood WarningFWD

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 00:55 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

6.7 hours after it, 56 km from the path. June 26, 2007.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Fort Worth, TX at 12:00Z on 2007-06-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 841 joules per kilogram, CIN -6, lifted condensation level 636 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 2007-06-26The 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 57 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 9 knots.1939Sfc1 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
841 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-6 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1079 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
636 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
9 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
57 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
102 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Decatur (LUD), 6 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
03:28 UTC71.669.890° 5 kt1017.3
03:49 UTC71.669.8180° 7 kt1017.9RA
04:08 UTC71.669.890° 6 kt1017.3-RA
04:28 UTC73.469.8120° 6 kt1017.3-RA
04:50 UTC73.471.6110° 6 kt1017.3-RA
05:10 UTC71.669.8140° 6 kt1017.3-RA
05:29 UTC73.469.8150° 9 kt1016.9-RA
05:48 UTC73.471.6140° 12 kt171016.9
06:08 UTC73.471.6140° 11 kt161017.3
06:28 UTC73.471.6140° 13 kt201017.3RA
06:48 UTC73.471.6120° 11 kt1016.9+RA
07:08 UTC73.471.6140° 13 kt1016.6-RA

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

The radar

The Dallas/Ft Worth radar (KFWS), 83 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:16 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)ReportWhereCountyRemark
05:15 UTCTSTM WND DMG10 Ne DecaturWise, TXMOBILE HOME WITH WINDOWS BLOWN OUT NORTHEAST OF DECATUR
05:35 UTCTSTM WND DMG9 Ene DecaturWise, TXTWO HOMES W/ROOF DAMAGE, SHED DAMAGE, AND A TRAMPOLINE BLOWN AWAY 2 MI N OF HWY 380, JUST INSIDE WISE CO ON WISE CO/DENTON CO LINE.
06:00 UTCFLASH FLOOD10 Ne DecaturWise, TXHWY 51 BETWEEN DECATUR AND SLIDELL WAS CLOSED DUE TO HIGH WATER
07:35 UTCFLASH FLOOD4 W NoconaMontague, TXHIGHWAY 82 4 MILES WEST OF NOCONA IS UNDER WATER AND BEING BARRACADED.
07:45 UTCFLASH FLOODNoconaMontague, TXFM 103 NORTH OF NOCONA CLOSED DUE TO HIGH WATER. HIGH WATER REPORTED OVER SEVERAL OTHER COUNTY ROADS NEAR NOCONA.

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 June 25, 2007

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 252:47 PM MDTEF0Otero, NM0.220
June 259:25 PM CDTEF0McLennan, TX1.0301$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.