Weather History

This Day In Weather History

In 2001, the Tri-State hailstorm clobbered the I-70 corridor from Northeast Kansas, across Missouri, to Southwest Illinois. The long-lived supercells started just southwest of Kansas City, Kansas, then clobbered Columbia, before eventually striking St. Louis. In terms of areal coverage and duration, it is the largest and longest hailstorm U.S. history.  It is also the costliest, with 2 billion dollars damage or 3.4 billion dollars today.  The hail was as large as baseballs. These supercells also spawned 26 tornadoes. While only 3 of the twisters reached F2, one F1 tornado that struck Central Missouri killed 1 and injured 2 in a mobile home.

In 1996, the world's strongest gust was measured at 253 mph when Super Typhoon Olivia barreled across Barrow Island, Australia.

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In 1979, the Western Red River Tornado Outbreak struck Northwest Texas and Southwest Oklahoma from midafternoon until early in the evening. Comprised of 13 tornadoes, this outbreak killed 59, injured 1,922, and caused around $450 million damage or 1.8 billon dollars today.

The deadliest and by far the costliest, was the Wichita Falls Tornado. It was a massive, violent F4 with a track 47 miles long and averaged three quarters of a mile wide. The vicious vortex killed 42, of which 25 were in vehicles, injured 1,740 and caused $400 million damage or 1.6 billion dollars today. When it tore through an eight mile stretch of a residential area, the vortex reached one and one half miles wide. It is the fifth deadliest tornado in Texas history, and the costliest tornado in U.S. history until the May third 1999 Moore, Oklahoma F5 disaster that caused a mind boggling $1 billion damage or 3.9 billion dollars today.

A second F4 tornado, with a track 39 miles long and averaging one half mile wide, struck Vernon, Texas. It killed 11, injured 67 and caused $27 million damage.

The longest tornado was a 64 mile long F2, that averaged one half mile wide.  On the ground for an hour and a half, it stretched from Harrold, Texas to midway between Lawton and Duncan, Oklahoma. It was likely stronger than an F2, but it tracked over mostly rural areas.
This Day in Weather History Archive