EF1 tornado, Tankersly Arpt to San Angelo, Texas, April 9, 2008

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 mphthis tornado

   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.

Rating

EF1

Date

April 9, 2008

Touchdown

12:14 AM CDT (05:14 UTC)

Lifted

12:18 AM CDT (05:18 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

4.1 miles (6.5 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$6.0 million

County

Tom Green County

Touchdown point

31.438, -100.518

Lift-off point

31.461, -100.454

Record number

0804092314-01

The combination of a strong upper level storm system and a dryline triggered widespread severe thunderstorms which moved east across West Central Texas Wednesday afternoon into early Thursday morning. During the late afternoon hours, isolated supercell thunderstorms developed across the Big Country along I-20 where storm chasers reported a couple brief tornadoes. At around midnight, a line of severe thunderstorms developed across the western sections of West Central Texas. As this line moved rapidly east, severe thunderstorms within the line evolved into supercells with strong rotation that went on to produce multiple tornadoes. There were also reports of straight line wind damage across West Central Texas from this line of severe thunderstorms.

The NWS storm survey found that a tornado tore the roof and some walls off the upper floor of a residential home just southwest of Tankersley. Wind speeds were estimated around 100 mph.

The NWS storm survey revealed that the tornado snapped tree limbs near the Twin Buttes Equalization Channel and downed 6 utility poles along Schwartz Road.

The NWS storm survey team found a tornado track across the Houston Harte Expressway that caused severe damage to a large distribution warehouse. Also, the tornado overturned 2 trailers, knocked down a communication tower, utility poles, and power lines, flipped cars, damaged roofs and road signs along the expressway. A couple of truck drivers who rode out the storm reported their tractor trailers were lifted at times during the tornado. One motorist in a smaller truck took shelter at the nearby Allsup's gas station reported being lifted up while he was in his small truck and seeing a small tornado.

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

28 minutes of warning. NWS SJT issued a tornado warning for this county at 04:46 UTC, 28 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 05:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 00:45 UTC and running to 06:25 UTC.

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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:01 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 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.

San Angelo/Mathis (SJT), 11 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The San Angelo radar (KSJT), 9 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 05:13 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 2008 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

20 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.