EF0 tornado, Codman to Canadian Hemphill Ar, Texas, November 16, 2015

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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 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

EF0

Date

November 16, 2015

Touchdown

7:45 PM CST (01:45 UTC)

Lifted

7:55 PM CST (01:55 UTC)

On the ground

10 minutes

Path length

7.2 miles (11.6 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Counties

Roberts and Hemphill counties

Touchdown point

35.789, -100.622

Lift-off point

35.854, -100.521

Record number

1511161945-01

4 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS AMA, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF3. The highest wind the damage implies is 140 mph.

• 8 or more snapped poles. tree tops shredded.
• High tension metal lines collapsed south of this pic toward Codman. Ground scoured. Moved to approx location near electical substation - NF.

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

A powerful storm system brought significant severe weather to the region. Tornadoes, damaging winds, and large hail accompanied thunderstorms that formed during the afternoon hours and persisted into the evening. This was a very unusual event for late fall in the Central High Plains. One significant factor in this anomalous event was the presence of an unusual amount of moisture for mid-November, contributing to relatively high values of instability. No tornadoes had previously been documented in the Texas Panhandle during the month of November.

The details of this tornado track was primarily based on video and photo evidence, and radar data. This tornado was produced by the same supercell which caused the tornado near Groom and the tornado near Pampa which destroyed the Halliburton Plant. Damage from this particular tornado was limited to broken wooden utility poles in Roberts County. The tornado was rated EF-1 with an estimated maximum wind speed of 100 mph.

The path details of this tornado are based on trained spotter accounts and radar information. No damage was observed. A rating of EF-0 was assigned. This tornado moved into Hemphill County.

This tornado began in Roberts County. The path details of this tornado are based on trained spotter accounts and radar information. No damage was observed. A rating of EF-0 was assigned.

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

25 minutes of warning. NWS AMA issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:20 UTC, 25 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 02:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 19:07 UTC and running to 02:42 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 Enhanced 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 01:06 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 Amarillo radar (KAMA), 122 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:44 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

38 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.