EF1 Tornado — Wheeler, Texas

2024-03-24 · near Shamrock, Wheeler, Texas

Event narrative

This quick, brief tornado touched down to the north of I-40. Spotters reported a funnel cloud had crossed I-40, but no damage was noted. The tornado caused damage to the Dalton O Gorman Rodeo Arena. Here it caused roof damage where a large section of the eastern half of the roof was blown off and the south facing wall was blown down. No other damage occurred in this area so it is believed to be a narrow path. The tornado

lifted soon thereafter. The estimated winds with this tornado was 100mph.

Wider weather episode

Lingering surface moisture collected along a dryline which eventually lead to the formation of some thunderstorms along a line from Panhandle to Borger to Guymon. This eventually reached an atmospheric environment of better shear and instability in the eastern portions of the Texas Panhandle as well as in Beaver County, Oklahoma. This result in the intensification of storms and a few of these storms became strong with up to on half inch in diameter hail. Storms strengthened further and became severe producing quarter size hail and winds up to 70 mph. Once the dryline passed the surface relative humidity dropped quickly with gusty winds spreading east across the rest of the Panhandles. This kept critical fire conditions in place across the rest of the Panhandles with severe storms exiting to the east. The strong winds associated with this system did pull in a significant amount of dust and pushed into the southern Texas Panhandle.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (35.2310, -100.2652)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1166019. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.