Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2017

EF1 tornado, Burkeville, Texas, January 18, 2017

This EF1 tornado ran 0.6 miles across Newton County on January 18, 2017, touching down at 1:40 PM CST and reaching 25 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
January 18, 2017
Touchdown
1:40 PM CST (19:40 UTC)
Lifted
1:41 PM CST (19:41 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.6 miles (1.0 km)
Path width
25 yards (23 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$50,000
County
Newton County
Touchdown point
30.988, -93.617
Lift-off point
30.988, -93.607
Record number
1701181340-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A warm front lifted north across the region ahead of an area of low pressure. A few storms developed over the region while this occurred, and one storm produced a brief tornado.

A tornado touched down near a field off of FM 2991 east of Burkeville,|seen by several eyewitnesses. It knocked a tree down on the edge of|the field, before moving across the field and picking up a deer feed|and watering device. As the device flew through the air, it decapitated|a deer, killing it. The tornado blew part of the tin roof off a a one|story home,and peeled back the carport on the other side of the home.|Several trees in the neighborhood were uprooted or snapped at the trunk. The peak estimated winds were 105 MPH.

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.

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 Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 16:25 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.

Lake Charles Mun, LA (KLCH), 12:00Z

7.7 hours before the tornado, 104 km from the path. January 18, 2017.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 12:00Z on 2017-01-18Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 729 joules per kilogram, CIN -4, lifted condensation level 512 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, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 12:00Z on 2017-01-18The 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 78 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 46 knots.19395878Sfc1 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
729 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-4 J/kg
Surface CAPE
704 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
512 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
46 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
78 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
122 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.2
Supercell composite
1.5
0-3 km lapse rate
5.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Lake Charles Mun, LA (KLCH), 00:00Z

4.3 hours after it, 104 km from the path. January 19, 2017.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 00:00Z on 2017-01-19Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 602 joules per kilogram, CIN -6, lifted condensation level 625 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, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 00:00Z on 2017-01-19The 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 73 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 40 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
602 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-6 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1131 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
625 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
40 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
73 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
99 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.2
Supercell composite
2.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

De Ridder/Beauregard Regional (DRI), 31 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
17:55 UTC71.4700° 0 kt1018.6
18:15 UTC72.5710° 0 kt1017.9
18:35 UTC7270.7180° 5 kt1017.6-RA
18:55 UTC6967.8190° 3 kt1017.3RA
19:15 UTC69.668.20° 0 kt1016.6
19:35 UTC7371.4150° 6 kt1015.9
19:55 UTC73.672170° 7 kt1015.6
20:15 UTC74.872170° 8 kt1015.6
20:35 UTC75.270.2180° 11 kt1015.2
20:55 UTC170° 11 kt151015.2
21:15 UTC170° 9 kt1015.2
21:35 UTC170° 10 kt1015.2

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

The radar

The Ft Polk radar (KPOE), 63 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 19:42 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.

What was reported nearby

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

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
19:40 UTCTSTM WND DMG4 Ese BurkevilleNewton, TXNEWTON COUNTY EMERGENCY MANAGER RELAYED REPORTS OF TREES DOWN ALONG FM 2991

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2017 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

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.