F3 tornado in McIntosh County, Oklahoma

The F3 tornado described here was the second of two tornadoes to touch down in the Checotah area on the evening of June 1. Both tornadoes were spawned from the same parent thunderstorm. Even though this tornado had a stronger F-rating than the first, it caused less widespread damage since it travelled through a less densely populated area. The second tornado touched down on the southeast side of Checotah near I-40 and Grapevine Road at 650 PM CDT. The tornado travelled southeast for 4.5 miles and then lifted at 706 PM CDT.Damage assessments in Checotah combined the effects of the first and second tornadoes. For details of the damage assessment, see the third paragraph of the narrative for the Tornado entry immediately preceding this entry. This tornado, the second of the two, was rated an F3 based based on the near-complete destruction of a farm house 3 to 4 miles southeast of Checotah.

Summary of events for the afternoon and evening of June 1 1999:A cold front moving in from the northwest moved into an extremely unstable air mass on the afternoon of June 1. Along the front, an isolated supercell thunderstorm developed around the Pryor/Locust Grove area and then moved in a slow and unusual south-southwest direction. This storm produced very large hail in addition to several strong tornadoes. This storm also produced eastern Oklahoma's first killer tornado in at least half of a decade.