EF3 Tornado — Morris, Texas

2022-11-04 · near Cason, Morris, Texas

Event narrative

The supercell thunderstorm which produced a brief and weak tornado in eastern Camp County then went on to produce a stronger and longer-lasting tornado from southwestern Morris County and into northwestern Cass County. This EF-3 tornado with estimated maximum winds of 155 mph initially started along FM-144 south of the Cason community and very quickly became quite destructive, producing EF-3 damage to a home, and EF-2 damage to multiple structures before tracking northeast to Texas Highway 11. A few mobile homes were destroyed near the start of the tornado which resulted in several injuries. The tornado continued to track northeast from Texas Highway 11 to Highway 49, doing mostly EF-1 damage for 3 miles before reaching Highway 49. As the tornado crossed Highway 49, two nearby homes were completely destroyed and largely swept from their foundations and at least one injury resulted. This damage was only rated EF-2 because of the pier and beam foundation construction of both homes did not anchor the structures well to the intense wind loading. Behind the homes, some isolated tree debarking was observed with a swath of EF-3 damage with maximum winds of 140 mph. The tornado continued to the northeast, completely destroying a mobile home along CR-3201, where one fatality associated with this tornado occurred. The tornado continued to advance northeastward, doing mainly EF-1 damage to trees and some structures before knocking over and destroying a few large electrical transmission lines near the intersection of CR-3211 and CR-3209. EF-2 level winds at 125 mph were estimated to have caused this structural damage. Finally, the tornado continued on another several miles to the northeast across U.S. Highway 259 before crossing into northwestern Cass County.

Wider weather episode

A strong upper level trough progressed through the Rockies and into the Central and Southern Plains during the day on November 4th, enhancing strong surface low development over the Upper Red River Valley into Oklahoma. This produced a strong pressure gradient over the Southern Plains and Lower Mississippi Valley, allowing for very rich Gulf moisture to surge north across the Ark-La-Tex area into Eastern Oklahoma and much of Arkansas. This generated moderate instability across these areas during the afternoon, as temperatures rose into the lower to mid 80s. Very strong wind shear was also in place over these areas, with the upper trough reinforcing a cold front southeast into Southeast Oklahoma, Western Arkansas, and East Texas. This trough enhanced large scale forcing along the front, with discrete supercell development also occurring ahead of the main line of storms over portions of East Texas, Southeast Oklahoma, and Southwest Arkansas. Multiple tornadoes, some strong, touched down across these areas, with additional instances of damaging winds also reported before the line of storms overtook these discrete supercells and shifted east across the remainder of East Texas, Southwest Arkansas, and into North Louisiana during the evening and overnight hours.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (33.0218, -94.8157)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1063555. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.