EF3 tornado in Clark County, Kansas
Tornado May 23, 2008 · Clark County, Kansas
NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Clark County → Kiowa County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.
The path drawn at its surveyed width of 3,170 yards (1.80 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.
What the National Weather Service wrote
This extremely large tornado (1.8 miles wide) moved east and then turned northeast towards Kiowa county. Many power poles were taken down by the tornado. It also caused EF3 damage to trees, two old houses, barns and it carried an oil tank battery 1.8 miles depositing it in trees. There was at least 20 head of cattle killed by the tornado. There was minor injuries received by a 20 year old male as he took refuge in his truck that was parked next to a baler inside a barn. The barn was completely swept away leaving the young man with cuts from broken glass. The baler that was left standing probably protected him and his truck from going airborne, if not rolling. Also, there was serious injury to a male in a semi on highway 34 in the vicinity of 37.3327 N, 99.6344 W probably by the RFD. Two other semis parked at this location rolled over but no injuries were sustained by the drivers. This extremely large tornado moved into Kiowa county. The radar signature was eerily similar to the Greensburg tornado that occurred on May 4, 2007.
The wider storm
An anonymously strong upper level system allowed everything to come together at the surface to produced what is perhaps the biggest tornado outbreak to ever occur in the Dodge City CWA! Fifty-five tornadoes were documented during that afternoon and evening! Some of the tornadoes were very large and damaging. The character of the supercell thunderstorms that day had similarities to the storms that produced the Greensburg tornado a little over a year after. In fact there was one tornado that was just as large and perhaps could have been just as damaging that was headed towards the small Kiowa county town but fortunately turned and dissipated.
Began near Clark State Lake (37.3428, -99.7264).
Other tornadoes from the same storm system
50 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 109776. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.
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