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EF2 tornado in Shannon County, Missouri

Tornado May 8, 2009 · Shannon County, Missouri

EF2
Rating
27.9 mi
Whole path
880 yd
Path width
2
Injuries
$2.5M
Damage as recorded

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

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 880 yards (0.50 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

This tornado is a continuation of the southeastern Texas County tornado. A National Weather Service storm survey revealed that an EF-2 tornado entered rural west central Shannon County from southeastern Texas County. This tornado tracked across forested areas of west central and central Shannon County, uprooting and snapping numerous trees. The Missouri Department of Conservation announced that the tornado and other high winds from this event resulted in $13M of damage to trees. The tornado also damaged a sawmill along its path.

The wider storm

An intense squall line impacted extreme southeast Kansas and the Missouri Ozarks with mainly damaging winds. However, 19 tornadoes along with large hail was also observed. Due to the straight line nature of the winds, damage was widespread and intense.

Began near Blue Spgs (37.0801, -91.6545).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 173361. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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