Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2008

EF1 tornado, Yellowpine, Texas, February 16, 2008

This EF1 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Sabine County on February 16, 2008, touching down at 9:40 PM CST and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, 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 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.

The record

Rating
EF1
Date
February 16, 2008
Touchdown
9:40 PM CST (03:40 UTC)
Lifted
9:43 PM CST (03:43 UTC)
On the ground
3 minutes
Path length
0.3 miles (0.5 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$50,000
County
Sabine County
Touchdown point
31.260, -93.831
Lift-off point
31.264, -93.828
Record number
0802162140-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Severe thunderstorms developed across portions of northeast Texas and northwest Louisiana during the late evening hours of February 16th. These storms developed in a very unstable airmass across the Lower Mississippi Valley as an upper level storm system moved out of the southwest United States towards the region. These storms produced large hail and damaging thunderstorms winds ahead of a strong cold front. Low level wind shear was also present in the atmosphere and as a result...a tornado developed near the Toledo Bend Reservoir in deep east Texas.

A tornado touched down in an open field near the Yellowpine Community. It travelled northeast destroying a large hay barn. Several trees and power lines were also snapped off. Tin roofing material was noted in the trees roughly 100 feet north of the barn across the road. Debris also damaged a trailer home on the east side of SR. 87 and the skirting was blown off.

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

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
23:45 UTC02:54 UTCTornado WatchSHV
00:00 UTC10:00 UTCLake Wind AdvisorySHV
19:00 UTC14:56 UTCFlood WarningSHV

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 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 01:15 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.

Shreveport, LA (KSHV), 00:00Z

3.7 hours before the tornado, 136 km from the path. February 17, 2008.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Shreveport, LA at 00:00Z on 2008-02-17Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 237 joules per kilogram, CIN -261, lifted condensation level 667 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, Shreveport, LA at 00:00Z on 2008-02-17The 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 408 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 50 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
237 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-261 J/kg
Surface CAPE
279 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
667 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
50 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
34 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
408 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
591 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
1.2
0-3 km lapse rate
5.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Shreveport, LA (KSHV), 12:00Z

8.3 hours after it, 136 km from the path. February 17, 2008.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Shreveport, LA at 12:00Z on 2008-02-17Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -93937, lifted condensation level 1530 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Shreveport, LA at 12:00Z on 2008-02-17The 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 238 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 86 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-93937 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1530 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
86 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
37 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
238 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
211 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
2.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
02:20 UTCTSTM WND DMG5 Se CenterShelby, TXSHERIFFS OFFICE REPORTS TREE DOWN ALONG CR 417, NEAR HWY 87S IN SHELBYVILLE.
03:30 UTCTSTM WND DMGHemphillSabine, TXMULTIPLE REPORTS OF TREES AND POWERLINES DOWN ACROSS THE COUNTY.
03:40 UTCTORNADO6 Sse HemphillSabine, TXTORNADO TOUCHED DOWN IN AN OPEN FIELD NEAR THE YELLOWPINE COMMUNITY. IT TRAVELLED NORTHEAST DESTROYING A BARN...SNAPPING PINE TREES...AND DAMAGING A MOBILE HOME. PATH LENGTH - APPROXIMATELY 1/3 MILE. PATH WIDTH - APPROXI
04:40 UTCTSTM WND DMG5 E NewtonNewton, TXTREES BLOWN DOWN EAST OF NEWTON.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2008 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of February 16, 2008

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
February 166:30 AM CSTEF1Pointe Coupee Parish, LA2.540$150,000
February 169:35 PM CSTEF0Galveston, TX0.015

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.