EF2 Tornado — Adair, Iowa

2019-05-22 · near Adair, Adair, Iowa

Event narrative

Tornado developed south southeast of Adair and moved quickly north. Initial damage was mainly to trees, grain bins and outbuildings. Three houses were encountered by the tornado with the first two receiving EF0 damage. The third house had the roof removed with several of the outside walls collapsing, but the inside walls remaining intact. Two individuals were sleeping inside when the tornado arrived with one injury and one fatality occurring. This structure sustained EF2 damage with the tornado passing over Interstate 80 and remaining in rural cropland for the remainder of its path in Adair County. The tornado then crossed into Guthrie County before dissipating.

Wider weather episode

Thunderstorms moved northeast into Iowa overnight. While overall instability was around 500 J/KG, the 0-3km MLCAPE was over 125 J/KG across southwest Iowa accounting for around a third of the overall updraft strength. Effective helicity values were nearly 500 m2/s2. The strongly sheared environment along with decent near surface instability led to the development of two tornadoes across southwest Iowa during the night. The first tornado was an EF-1 and virtually destroyed an old farm building southeast of Anita. The second more powerful tornado occurred southeast of Adair and impacted a few different farmsteads. The final farmstead encountered received EF-2 damage producing 1 injury and 1 fatality. The tornado crossed Interstate 80 and then remained in rural cropland for the remainder of the path.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (41.4557, -94.6249)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 814521. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.