The Season Thus Far

The 2024 tornado season had been off to a rather slow start in March and early April. Although there was a multi state tornado outbreak doing its worse damage in Indiana and Ohio where a high end EF3 went through the town of Winchester Indiana, sadly killing one. In late April is when the season exploded, there was a prolific 3 day tornado outbreak from Iowa to Oklahoma where 2 large EF4s hit the towns of Elkhorn Nebraska, and Marietta Oklahoma.

The High Risk Setup

After the very active late April, another multiday severe weather outbreak was being picked up on by the SPC (Storm Prediction Center). The first outlook they issued for the 6th was on may 1st, they added a 15% risk for all hazards from southern Nebraska to eastern Texas. As model confidence grew so did the intensity of the risk issued by the SPC, they issued a rare day 4 30% risk mentioning strong tornadoes in the forecast. The day before the 6th the spc issued a level 4/5 moderate risk for Oklahoma and Kansas sighting the risk for a large scale tornado outbreak. At 13z the SPC pulled the trigger and issued a level 5/5 high risk for central Oklahoma and extreme southern Kansas.

The Event

The first tornado to do structural damage was in Tennessee, thankfully the tornado was fairly weak only doing ef1 damage to some structures. Surprisingly almost all of the tornadoes ended up weak, this was a result of the storms getting messy and forming into a line. Although this messy storm mode would likely save countless communities from destruction, it would ultimately doom the town of Barnsdall Oklahoma.

The Worst Case Scenario

In front of the line of storms a pre frontal cell formed, this cell was in an insanely favorable environment for strong to violent tornadoes. Sadly the storm got its act together and dropped a monster at 9:12 pm CST. The tornado then did its first damage to some trees at EF1 intensity north of county road 1701. Moving northeast it intensified to low end EF3 toppling and bending steel electrical poles, and destroying outbuildings. Maintaining EF3 intensity it moved through mostly open land only hitting trees and grazing homes. Sadly as it moved closer to Barnsdall it rapidly intensified to mid range EF4 debarking wide swaths of trees, scouring the ground, and wiping a home clean off its foundation. Right before hitting town it turned more east, this saved downtown from the brunt of the damage but doomed the neighborhoods east of town. The first buildings hit in the towns borders were directly south of downtown on an extension of State Highway 11. On this road multiple buildings were demolished, including a large metal building. The next areas impacted were neighborhoods on North 2nd Street and East Walnut Ave. Sadly the homes in this area were not well built and stood no match to the 180 mph winds. This resulted in multiple structures getting completely swept clean, with the worst of the damage being inflicted on North 2nd Street were 4 homes were swept off their foundations and debris being granulated into small pieces. After the tornado left town, it did EF1-EF2 damage in Bartlesville and at 10:07 pm it was gone.

The Aftermath and Response

As daylight broke the realization of the devastation in Barnsdall came with. The rest of the town woke up to no east side, people were killed, injured, and lost homes. Multiple non profits came in to give temporary shelter, food, and water to the residents. “This was one of the worst tornadoes I’ve ever seen, and my heart goes out to the Oklahomans waking up this morning to assess the damage and destruction to their homes and businesses," Bill Coleman a senator of Oklahoma at the time. As of writing this the town still has not came back from that faithful Monday night in may, but some have started to rebuild but the lives of Wayne Hogue and Rhonda Hayman will never come back.

The Elkhorn EF4 at peak intensity, taken by Celton Henderson.