EF1 tornado, Bagwell to Madras, Texas, March 8, 2011

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

March 8, 2011

Touchdown

5:15 PM CST (23:15 UTC)

Lifted

5:35 PM CST (23:35 UTC)

On the ground

20 minutes

Path length

10.6 miles (17.1 km)

Path width

225 yards (206 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$400,000

County

Red River County

Touchdown point

33.630, -95.182

Lift-off point

33.649, -94.999

Record number

1103081715-01

36 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS SHV, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 105 mph.

• roofing material missing...some visible damage to the exterior
• semi trailer rolled onto car
• partially rotted tree fell next to a home
• fema trailer destroyed. eyewitness says it exploded

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

A potent upper level storm system moved out of the southern Great Basin and into the Southern Plains during the afternoon hours of March 8th. This upper level storm system was preceded by a warm front which extended near the Interstate 30 corridor of Northeast Texas and Southwest Arkansas. Isolated severe thunderstorms developed in the vicinity of the warm front across southern Arkansas, while isolated supercell thunderstorms developed along a dryline across Northeast Texas. These storms produced large hail and an isolated tornado in Red River County, Texas.

The National Weather Service conducted a storm survey in Red River County, Texas, and concluded that storm damage was the result of an EF1 tornado. The tornado touched down at around 515 pm CST, approximately 8 miles west of Clarksville, Texas, along U.S. Hwy. 82 where it knocked down several small trees. The tornado tracked east-northeast crossing CR 2123 where it damaged several trees. It then crossed CR 2161 northwest of Clarksville damaging trees along the road. The damage up to CR 2161 was all EF0. Once the tornado reached the north side of Clarksville, it intensified and widened to its widest point. The tornado crossed through a neighborhood north of Clarksville on the west side of Hwy. 37 where approximately a dozen homes sustained minor damage to their roofs, awnings, or carports. Numerous trees were snapped or damaged as well. Just north of the neighborhood at a business, a FEMA trailer was completely destroyed with insulation and pieces of the trailer strewn northeast and east. On the east side of Hwy. 37, numerous powerpoles were snapped, a semi tractor trailer was overturned onto a small pickup, and a home sustained moderate damage to the roof. The tornado continued east-northeast crossing FM 1159 and CR 1700. The tornado continued east, north of CR 1700, damaging trees before lifting east of CR 3202. The tornado was on the ground for nearly 11 miles and a total of approximately 20 minutes. Maximum winds were estimated at 80-90 mph. The maximum width of the tornado was 225 yards wide.

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

42 minutes of warning. NWS SHV issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:33 UTC, 42 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:30 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 19:34 UTC and running to 02:00 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 19:56 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.

Clarksville (LBR), 6 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Shreveport radar (KSHV), 176 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:16 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.

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 2011 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

4 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.