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EF4 tornado in Woodbury County, Iowa

Tornado October 4, 2013 · Woodbury County, Iowa

EF4
Rating
24.7 mi
Whole path
2,600 yd
Path width
$2.0M
Damage as recorded

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

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 2,600 yards (1.48 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF4 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF4 is devastating damage: well-built houses levelled, consistent with estimated gusts of 166–200 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

A tornado severely damaged or destroyed about 10 houses, collapsing most walls on a few of the houses, tearing most of the roofs off other houses, and shifting what was left of some houses off their foundations. The tornado caused significant damage to roofs, windows, and siding of additional houses. Numerous farm outbuildings, storage buildings, and a few silos were destroyed or severely damaged. The tornado also destroyed or damaged several pieces of farm equipment, caused significant tree damage, including numerous trunks snapped or uprooted and other trees stripped, and blew down power poles and lines. The tornado then crossed into Cherokee County.

The wider storm

Thunderstorms produced eleven tornadoes, several of them causing damage, which tracked wholly or partly in northwest Iowa during the afternoon and early evening of October 4th. There were also two reports of large hail and one report of non tornadic damaging thunderstorm winds.

Began near Climbing Hill (42.3319, -96.1086).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 476100. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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