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EF2 tornado in McCurtain County, Oklahoma

Tornado April 9, 2009 · McCurtain County, Oklahoma

EF2

Rating

40.1 mi

Whole path

850 yd

Path width

Injuries

$5.1M

Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through McCurtain County → Sevier County, Arkansas → Howard County, Arkansas → Pike County, Arkansas → Pike County, Arkansas; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 850 yards (0.48 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF2 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF2 is considerable damage: roofs torn off well-built houses, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, consistent with estimated gusts of 111–135 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

The tornado first touched down in extreme east central McCurtain County just one quarter of a mile from the McCurtain County, Sevier County line. Several trees were downed on the McCurtain County side of the state line with a few power lines downed as well.

The wider storm

A strong upper level storm system along with a surface dry line/front

over northeast Texas moved east during the evening hours of April 9th into the early morning hours of April 10th causing long lived supercell thunderstorms. These thunderstorms caused long track tornadoes to occur across southeast Oklahoma, southwest Arkansas, northeast Texas, and north Louisiana.

Began near Eagletown (34.0100, -94.4800).

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 154447. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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