EF1 tornado, Woodward to Gardendale, Texas, May 15, 2015

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

May 15, 2015

Touchdown

6:29 AM CDT (11:29 UTC)

Lifted

6:35 AM CDT (11:35 UTC)

On the ground

6 minutes

Path length

2.3 miles (3.6 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

1

Property damage

$100,000

County

La Salle County

Touchdown point

28.542, -99.389

Lift-off point

28.520, -99.361

Record number

1505150529-01

8 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS CRP, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

• Unanchored cabin on pier and beam rolled and destroyed.
• Unanchored Cabin on Pier and Beam rolled and destroyed with debris tossed 100 yards.
• Metal roof of large barn was lifted and tossed over 100 yards in open field. Covered car port also collapsed. Many large trees snapped.
• Metal building anchors broke loose and building was tossed 30 yards.

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

Abundant moisture over the region along with a potent upper level disturbance created another severe weather and heavy rain event across South Texas on May 15th. Around daybreak, storms moved into La Salle and McMullen counties where tornadoes produced damage near Woodward. The storms continued to the east and drifted southward with widespread 2 to 3 inches of rain across La Salle, McMullen, Live Oak and Bee counties. Flooding occurred near the cities of Cotulla, Encinal, George West, and Beeville. The storms tapped into even more moisture from the Gulf of Mexico along the coast and expanded into a strong squall line. Two tornadoes occurred in the Coastal Bend at Corpus Christi and at Gregory. The damage was primarily confined to a business on the south side of Corpus Christi. Three injuries occurred near Gregory when a construction trailor flipped at a construction site.

NWS storm survey confirmed an EF-1 tornado caused damage on a private ranch in rural northwest La Salle County. The tornado touched down near Johnson Ranch Road just northeast of Farm to Market Road 468. A rancher was thrown from his barn and landed on top of his trailer. Numerous large trees were snapped at their base and several trees were uprooted. The tornado destroyed a wooden cabin, lofting debris |about 100 yards. Wind speeds were estimated at 85 to 90 mph.

A tornado moved across a ranch and damaged a couple of barns. Three trees were uprooted and many branches were broken.

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:01 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.

The Laughlin AFB radar (KDFX), 121 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 11:31 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 2015 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

11 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.