EF3 Tornado — Sterling, Texas

2024-05-22 · near Sterling City Cld Ar, Sterling, Texas

Event narrative

A tornado touched down west of State Highway 163 at a ranch house

on Private Road 127. The tornado damaged the roof of the ranch

house as well as flipped over an RV trailer next to the house.

Between the ranch house and Highway 163, the tornado strengthened

destroying at least two utility poles, severely damaging trees as

well as turning over an oil pump jack. As the tornado approached

and crossed Highway 163, the tornado continued to intensify

damaging several utility poles along the highway and then moving

across a deer lease off Private Road 128, east of Highway 163. The

tornado completely stripped the rocks, the grass, the top soil, and

the caliche roads on the property. Only the stubs of the trunks of

the trees remained on the property. The estimated peak wind of

the tornado was 140 mph.

Wider weather episode

The combination of a well defined surface dryline, extreme instability, and strong wind shear, resulted in producing supercell thunderstorms across west central Texas. A supercell thunderstorm resulted in a significant hail storm across western and southern portions of the city of San Angelo. The hail stones ranged from golf ball to slightly larger than baseball size. There was major damage to the outer structure of homes, including roofs and windows and many automobiles had significant damage. Another supercell thunderstorm produced a tornado in Sterling County. Other severe thunderstorms across portions of west central Texas produced large hail and damaging winds.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (31.5844, -101.1025)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1187525. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.