EF0 tornado, Crowell to Thalia, Texas, May 4, 2022

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

May 4, 2022

Touchdown

7:40 PM CDT (00:40 UTC)

Lifted

7:56 PM CDT (00:56 UTC)

On the ground

16 minutes

Path length

9.3 miles (15.0 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Foard County

Touchdown point

33.870, -99.900

Lift-off point

33.900, -99.748

Record number

2205041840-01

7 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LUB and NWS OUN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 74 mph.

• NWS Employeee photo of tornado with condensation funnel north of CR 204 in far northeast King County.

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

Storms moved in from the Texas panhandle during the evening of the 4th, bringing tornadoes to western sections of north Texas.

Storm chasers observed this tornado that initially developed in northern King County TX (see separate entry for King County from NWS Lubbock TX) before moving northeast into the far southwest corner of Foard County. A storm survey observed no damage as this tornado occurred in open ranchland with few roads, so the specific location is estimated.

This tornado developed southwest of Crowell and was observed by many storm spotters and storm chasers. Although information from storm chasers indicate that the tornado initially formed farther to the west-southwest in open ranchland, the damage found in a storm survey was generally confined to mesquite tree limb damage observed on FM-263 about 3 miles west of State Highway 6. Numerous storm chaser videos and observations show that the tornado turned more to just south of east after crossing FM-263 and narrowly missed wind turbines along FM-263 just west of Highway 6 before turning to the northeast and crossing State Highway 6 before dissipating.

Storm chasers reported a tornado southeast of Crowell at 811 pm CDT. No damage is known to have occurred and the location is estimated based on the chasers' viewpoints.

The Lockett tornado was observed by storm spotters and storm chasers to have developed in eastern Foard County to the southwest of Thalia. This tornado moved east and then northeast before crossing into Wilbarger County and eventually moving through Lockett TX. In Foard County, only tree damage was observed along County Road 183, otherwise the tornado moved through open or inaccessible ranchland.

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

43 minutes of warning. NWS OUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:57 UTC, 43 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:00 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 18:56 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 19:33 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.

Vernon (F05), 63 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Altus AFB radar (KFDR), 94 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:39 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 2022 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

17 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.