Unrated tornado, Pringle to Spearman, Texas, May 7, 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 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. Unratedthis tornado

   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

Unrated

Date

May 7, 2019

Touchdown

3:36 PM CDT (20:36 UTC)

Lifted

3:49 PM CDT (20:49 UTC)

On the ground

13 minutes

Path length

2.9 miles (4.7 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Counties

Hutchinson and Hansford counties

Touchdown point

36.039, -101.247

Lift-off point

36.080, -101.234

Record number

1905071436-01

May 7th, 2019 was a very active day for significant severe weather which lasted from early morning into the evening. A combination of an approaching strong upper level storm system that moved across Arizona into New Mexico, moderate to high levels of wind shear and moderate to high levels of instability led to the severe thunderstorm and tornadic events. Thunderstorms that started in the late morning hours for the northwestern Texas/Oklahoma produced hail that was generally below 1 inch. This activity drifted into the north central Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles by early afternoon. ||Wind shear and large scale lift increased as an upper level disturbance continued to move east crossing Arizona into New Mexico in the the afternoon and evening hours. As a result, supercell development increased as did storm intensity. Maximum hail size increased from less than one inch to golf ball and eventually baseball size with the strongest storms. Cooling produced by morning and early afternoon activity enhanced an existing weak surface boundary that extended across the south central Texas Panhandle northeastward into the eastern Oklahoma Panhandles. Supercell thunderstorms that developed along and near this boundary began generating tornadoes due to the additional wind shear it produced. In all, eight tornadoes formed across portions of the central and eastern Texas Panhandle into the early evening hours. The storms eventually congealed into a line of thunderstorms across the far eastern Panhandles before moving east out the region during the late evening of the 7th. In addition to the very large hail and tornadoes, severe wind gusts and localized flash flooding were all reported during this event across the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles.

NWS damage survey information found that a tornado touchdown first occurred about 11 miles SSW of Spearman at 0336 pm CDT and lifted at 0349 pm CDT approximately 8 miles SSW of Spearman. The tornado crossed the Hansford County line around 342 pm CDT. The tornado was rated EF-unknown, with track and times based on eyewitness accounts and video.

NWS damage survey information found that a tornado touchdown first occurred about 11 miles SSW of Spearman at 0336 pm CDT and lifted at 0349 pm CDT approximately 8 miles SSW of Spearman. The tornado crossed the Hansford County line around 342 pm CDT. The tornado was rated EF-unknown, with track and times based on eyewitness accounts and video.

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.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 18:28 UTC and running to 02:58 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 Moderate 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 19:41 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), 101 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:37 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

22 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.