EF1 tornado, Boxelder to Avery, Texas, November 4, 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

November 4, 2024

Touchdown

5:40 PM CST (23:40 UTC)

Lifted

5:47 PM CST (23:47 UTC)

On the ground

7 minutes

Path length

7.5 miles (12.0 km)

Path width

275 yards (251 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Red River County

Touchdown point

33.510, -94.911

Lift-off point

33.580, -94.812

Record number

2411041740-01

9 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS SHV, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 90 mph.

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

An upper trough of low pressure traversed the Southern Plains on November 4th, which reinforced a cold front southeast into the region during the evening through the early morning hours of the 5th. Abnormally warm and humid conditions had spread north into Northeast Texas and Southeast Oklahoma ahead of the front, resulting in increased instability across the area along with ample wind shear generated near and ahead of the approaching trough. As a result, scattered strong to severe thunderstorms developed ahead of the front across portions of extreme Northeast Texas and Southeast Oklahoma during the late afternoon through the early evening hours.

An EF-1 tornado with estimated maximum winds near 90 mph touched down northwest of the Boxelder community, just west of Crystal Lake. The damage was very sporadic and consisted entirely of damage to hardwood and softwood trees, which had large limbs downed and a few trunks snapped. The tornado traveled northeast crossing FM 44 and FM 1701, and eventually across County Roads 4310 and 4315, resulting in more sporadic tree damage. The tornado crossed Highway 82 and snapped more tree limbs along County Road 3322 before lifting.

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

40 minutes of warning. NWS SHV issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:00 UTC, 40 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 23:30 UTC and running to 05:00 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 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 19:59 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.

Idabel (4O4), 40 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Shreveport radar (KSHV), 154 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:40 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

20 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.