EF1 tornado, Venetia to Buffalo, Texas, April 13, 2019

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

April 13, 2019

Touchdown

12:12 PM CDT (17:12 UTC)

Lifted

12:19 PM CDT (17:19 UTC)

On the ground

7 minutes

Path length

11.2 miles (18.1 km)

Path width

150 yards (137 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$10,000

County

Leon County

Touchdown point

31.324, -96.117

Lift-off point

31.458, -96.008

Record number

1904131112-01

13 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS FWD, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 107 mph.

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

A strong upper level trough generated scattered to numerous thunderstorms across North and Central Texas on Saturday April 13. Storms were mainly hail producers early in the day, but damaging winds and a few tornadoes occurred across the southern counties in the vicinity of a stationary front in the late morning and afternoon hours.

This tornado is a continuation from Milam and Robertson counties. After entering from eastern Robertson County, the tornado dissipated in extreme western Leon County, 4 miles south-southwest of Marquez. Only tree damage was observed along the path in Leon County.

The supercell thunderstorm that spawned the significant EF-3 tornado in Robertson County tracked into Leon County and produced a second tornado with EF-1 intensity damage. This tornado formed in a heavily forested area 3 miles southeast of Jewett. Several residences and outbuildings were impacted by the tornado in the central part of the county, east of Jewett to the south of Buffalo. Two residences along Leon County Road 363 lost small portions of roof material, with winds estimated around 100 mph. The tornado crossed I-45 about 5 miles south of Buffalo, snapping trees along the Interstate right-of-way. The tornado dissipated approximately 4 miles east of Buffalo.

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

30 minutes of warning. NWS FWD issued a tornado warning for this county at 16:42 UTC, 30 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 17:30 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 13:46 UTC and running to 18:16 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 16:12 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 Ft Hood radar (KGRK), 146 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 17:14 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 2019 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

35 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.