EF1 tornado, Manor to New Sweden, Texas, April 28, 2024

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 28, 2024

Touchdown

8:31 AM CDT (13:31 UTC)

Lifted

8:41 AM CDT (13:41 UTC)

On the ground

10 minutes

Path length

4.8 miles (7.8 km)

Path width

20 yards (18 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$5.0 million

County

Travis County

Touchdown point

30.340, -97.584

Lift-off point

30.371, -97.516

Record number

2404280731-01

There were two rounds of severe thunderstorms on the 28th. The first in the morning along a cold front as it moved into a warm, moist airmass with storms producing a tornado and damaging wind gusts. The second later in the day as the airmass recovered and a dryline moved in. These storms produced large hail.

A National Weather Service damage survey team found damage to a building under construction near Hwy 290 and Toll Road 130. Minor damage was seen at the Ford dealership on Hwy 290 and to a gas station near the intersection of 290 and Manor Downs Rd. where a large billboard was blown over into the gas station parking lot. Tree and roof damage was also noted at the gas station along with minor damage to a few businesses at the Lexington St./Hwy 290 intersection. All of this damage along Hwy 290 was rated EF0. The small tornado either weakened or reformed just to the north of Hwy 290 in Shadowglen with fence and shingle damage found to houses on several neighborhood roads. One house had significant EF1 roof damage where winds looks to have peaked at 110 mph. The small tornado appears to have weakened again as it moved ENE into the Stonewater neighborhood. Multiple homes had a significant amount of shingles removed, fences damaged, trampolines tossed, and some tree damage. The tornado appears to have dissipated somewhere NE of the Stonewater area.

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.

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 Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 12:40 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), 44 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 13:30 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 2024 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

18 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.