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EF2 tornado in Pope County, Arkansas

Tornado January 8, 2008 · Pope County, Arkansas

EF2
Rating
20.5 mi
Whole path
440 yd
Path width
1
Death
2
Injuries
$5.3M
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Pope County → Conway County → Van Buren County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 440 yards (0.25 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

A tornado touched down in central Pope County and tracked to the northeast. The Pope County Office of Emergency Management reported that 42 residential structures were affected. Of these, seven were destroyed, six had minor damage, and the rest had moderate to heavy damage. In addition, six chicken houses, two barns, and a number of outbuildings were destroyed, a travel trailer and motor home were overturned, and hundreds of trees were blown down. A 61 year-old man was killed and his wife was injured when their double-wide mobile home was destroyed on Simba Road, about 1.4 miles south-southeast of Appleton. Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe declared Pope County a state disaster area. The tornado continued into Conway County.

The wider storm

Severe thunderstorms affected a large part of Arkansas on the 8th. There were a number of reports of wind damage and an isolated tornado.

Began near Moreland (35.3541, -93.0075).

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 65417. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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