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EF1 tornado in Kingfisher County, Oklahoma

Tornado May 6, 2024 · Kingfisher County, Oklahoma

EF1
Rating
11.1 mi
Whole path
300 yd
Path width
$40K
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Blaine County → Kingfisher County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 300 yards (0.17 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF1 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF1 is moderate damage: roofs badly stripped, mobile homes pushed off foundations or overturned, windows broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 86–110 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

This tornado developed in Blaine County and moved into Kingfisher County about a mile and a half south of State Highway 51. Power poles were broken and trees were damaged along the path as it moved east and then northeast to the west of Lacey. One outbuilding received roof damage as the tornado crossed State Highway 51 to the west of Lacey. The tornado dissipated soon after crossing SH-51.

The wider storm

A significant severe weather outbreak, including ten (10) tornadoes, impacted northern and central portions of the WFO Norman Forecast Area during the evening of the 6th into the early morning hours of the 7th. The synoptic pattern across the western half of the Continental United States favored a significant severe weather episode across the region, with a powerful (110-120 knot) upper-level jet streak ejecting across the Central Plains during the evening of the 6th. In concert with robust kinematics in place, extreme instability (pockets of >4000-5000 J/kg of CAPE) promoted an environment favorable for significant severe weather. As such, the Storm Prediction Center issued a rare 'High Risk' of severe weather for portions of central and northern Oklahoma, the first to include portions of the WFO Norman Forecast Area since 20 May 2019.

Initial supercell thunderstorms developed in the late afternoon off an accelerating dryline/Pacific front near the 100th meridian. These initial supercell thunderstorms produced large to very large hail and damaging wind gusts, though failed to undergo tornadogenesis. This may have been due to the propensity for rapid and strong downdraft surges in the vicinity of low-level mesocyclones (among other factors). With time, as storms matured and moved into an environment characterized by richer low-level moisture, and as low-level flow increased, multiple tornado occurrences did result. Additional supercell thunderstorms and thunderstorm clusters developed by the late evening of the 6th across west-central into central Oklahoma. A particularly impactful cluster moved across the southern Oklahoma City Metropolitan area, producing numerous reports of significant thunderstorm wind damage (and gusts) and two weak tornadoes.

Began near Lacey (36.0960, -98.2100).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

9 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1184015. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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