EF2 tornado, Fairview to Luther, Texas, April 16, 2009

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 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 mphthis tornado

   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

EF2

Date

April 16, 2009

Touchdown

9:53 PM CDT (02:53 UTC)

Lifted

10:30 PM CDT (03:30 UTC)

On the ground

37 minutes

Path length

11.3 miles (18.2 km)

Path width

450 yards (411 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$83,000

County

Howard County

Touchdown point

32.304, -101.579

Lift-off point

32.429, -101.454

Record number

0904162053-01

A mid to upper level closed low was located over southwest Utah the day of the event. Near the surface, a quasi dryline was located from a line near the mountains of west Texas to the eastern NM/TX border. Dewpoints in the low to mid 50 F range resulted in moderate surface based instability east of the dryline during the early evening hours. The upper dynamics combined with the surface convergence along the dryline led to the development of severe weather as the deep layer shear increased with the approach of the aforementioned feature. There was also a brief window for tornadic storms as low level profiles became increasingly backed east of the dryline as height falls increased ahead of the upper trough just west of the region. A tornado watch was issued from 1642-2400 local.

At 1953 CST, a trained weather spotter reported a tornado about 5 miles northwest of Big Spring. The NWS Storm Survey confirmed two snapped power poles, minor tree damage and an empty oil pump storage tank knocked over near this location. The tornado then tracked north northeastward and bent an 80 foot aluminum radio tower in half towards the east and snapped two additional power poles due to damaging northerly winds on its northwest flank; this occurred sometime around 2000 CST. At 2005 CST, another trained spotter reported a tornado near the town of Fairview, TX. The damage survey concluded this was a valid report, as the tornado began to turn right snapping multiple power poles and damaging a 12���X10��� storage shed anchored 2-3 feet in the ground along the way. The storage shed was tossed east northeast approximately 30 yards, indicating the tornado passed north of the residence. As the tornado continued eastward just north of Farm to Market Road 2230 east of Fairview, a significant line of power pole damage (2 miles) was observed. There were a total of 28 poles snapped towards the south around 2015 CST. Twenty of these were distribution poles and 8 of these were larger transmission poles. The tornado then possibly weakened and turned left to the northeast. On its way, it damaged another storage shed and a home's north side windows approximately 4 miles northeast of Fairview. The last approximated time for tornadic wind damage was around 2030 CST. The path recorded for this event is not the exact path the tornado actually took. Please see attached image.

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

25 minutes of warning. NWS MAF issued a tornado warning for this county at 02:28 UTC, 25 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 03:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 21:42 UTC and running to 05:00 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 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 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.

Big_spring (BPG), 17 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Midland/Odessa radar (KMAF), 79 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:50 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 2009 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

15 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.