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EF3 tornado in Prowers County, Colorado

Tornado March 28, 2007 · Prowers County, Colorado

EF3

Rating

28.0 mi

Whole path

900 yd

Path width

Deaths

Injuries

$4.0M

Damage as recorded

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

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 900 yards (0.51 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF3 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF3 is severe damage: whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, consistent with estimated gusts of 136–165 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

With a maximum rating of EF3 and a maximum damage path width of 900 yards, the tornado raced through Holly, causing two fatalities and nine injuries.

The wider storm

A few severe thunderstorms occurred over extreme southeast Colorado... producing damaging winds and large hail. One supercell generated large hail...damaging winds...and two tornadoes. The tornado which struck Holly...rural northeast Prowers County...and rural southeast Kiowa County had a maximum rating of EF3. The path width reached a maximum of around 900 yards in extreme northeast Prowers County. Prior to this...as the tornado moved through Holly...the path width was around 600 feet. Over 200 residences and other buildings were affected or destroyed. Two people were killed and nine others were injured. The damage path was around 28 miles long...extending into Kiowa County. The last substantial damage with the tornado was 12 miles north of Holly...in northeast Prowers County...where a ranch sustained high end EF3 damage. As the supercell cycled through...another tornado occurred east of Towner...and moved into Kansas.

Began near Holly (38.0211, -102.1200).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

1 more tornado the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

EF1 Kiowa County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 22284. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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