EF1 Tornado — Columbia, Arkansas

2024-07-08 · near Plainfield, Columbia, Arkansas

Event narrative

This is a continuation of the Northern Webster Parish tornado. This EF-1 tornado, with estimated maximum winds near 105 mph, tracked northwest across Highway 19 just south of the Plainfield community where several large limbs were snapped. As the tornado approached and crossed County Road 208 in the Western community, more substantial damage to trees were noted with many snapped and uprooted. The tornado then lifted along County Road 3 north of Western and northwest of Plainfield.

Wider weather episode

Tropical Storm Beryl briefly strengthened into a Category 1 hurricane with 80 mph winds as it made landfall along the Southeast Texas coast near Matagorda Bay during the early morning hours of July 8th, and tracked north-northeast across East Texas and into Southwest Arkansas during the afternoon and evening hours. While Beryl weakened into a tropical storm over portions of Deep East Texas by mid-afternoon, very strong wind shear and helicity existed near and east of the center, contributing to the largest tornado outbreak in NWS Shreveport history, as well as with any landfalling tropical system. A total of 43 tornadoes were confirmed through NWS surveys across East Texas, North Louisiana, and Southwest Arkansas, before Beryl weakened into a depression by late afternoon over East Texas. As a part of this outbreak, six tornadoes touched down across portions of Southwest Arkansas.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (33.0182, -93.3056)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1195800. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.