EF2 Tornado — Kiowa, Kansas

2008-05-23 · near Mullinville, Kiowa, Kansas

Event narrative

This large tornado moved out of Clark county where it had done EF3 damage. In Kiowa county, EF2 damage was done to a concrete walled house. Trees also received EF2 damage. A power pole with transmission wire attached was deposited from an unknown location. The tornado turned sharply west towards the end of it's life.

Wider weather episode

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.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (37.4059, -99.5554)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 109782. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.