EF0 tornado, Midkiff to St Lawrence, Texas, March 28, 2017

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

March 28, 2017

Touchdown

7:21 PM CDT (00:21 UTC)

Lifted

7:25 PM CDT (00:25 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

5.8 miles (9.4 km)

Path width

75 yards (69 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Counties

Upton and Glasscock counties

Touchdown point

31.632, -101.816

Lift-off point

31.673, -101.732

Record number

1703281821-01

9 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS MAF, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF2. The highest wind the damage implies is 120 mph.

• 32 power poles down from this point, westward along Farm to Market 2401. The majority of these poles broken near the base.
• Silo or storage container moved east northeast from original location.
• Silo or storage container blown into an adjacent field from original location of 5.
• Outbuilding/small barn destroyed with one remaining standing wall

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

A deep upper low was over New Mexico with strong lift and instability over southeast New Mexico and West Texas. There was a dryline and cold front that moved across the area, and there was a lot of wind shear in the atmosphere. Good moisture was present to the east of the dryline. This combination of moisture, lift, instability, and wind shear contributed to thunderstorms that produced large hail, severe wind gusts, and tornadoes.

Trained spotters viewed and took images of a tornado that developed two miles east of the community of Midkiff along Farm to Market Road 2401 and continued northeastward into open fields in extreme southwest portions of Glasscock County. The tornado was narrow, perhaps 50 to 75 yards in width. No damage was found with this tornado, which travelled along a path for approximately 5.5 miles. After being viewed by a damage survey team, this tornado was rated as an EF-0.

Trained spotters viewed and took images of a tornado that developed two miles east of the community of Midkiff along Farm to Market Road 2401 and continued northeastward into open fields in extreme southwest portions of Glasscock County. The tornado was narrow, perhaps 50 to 75 yards in width. No damage was found with this tornado, which travelled along a path for approximately 5.5 miles. After being viewed by a damage survey team, this tornado was rated as an EF-0.

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

16 minutes of warning. NWS MAF issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:05 UTC, 16 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:30 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 18:51 UTC and running to 03:00 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 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:07 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.

Midland Intl (MAF), 52 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), 51 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:23 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 2017 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.