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EF4 Tornado — Pawnee, Kansas

2013-05-18 · near Burdett Rucker Arpt, Pawnee, Kansas

$140K

Property damage

7.0 mi

Path length

1100 yds

Path width

Event narrative

This tornado was well documented by storm chasers, spotters and a research team with portable doppler radar. The tornado did turn north towards the end of it's life cycle. Low end EF4 damage was done to a home along US156. The roof and walls were blown away of this well constructed house. Several large tanks were carried a long distance. There were 2 people inside but they escaped injury by taking shelter. Video shows that sub-vortices within the tornado may have actually had a little stronger wind. The Doppler on wheels that was observing the tornado had near surface measured wind speeds of 165 to 185 MPH.

Wider weather episode

High instability was in place as an upper level wind maxima moved out of the base of a deep upper trough in the west.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (38.1429, -99.4706)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 457695. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.