Tornado Outbreak Spawns Twisters in Four States; Flooding Also Reported

Note: For impacts on the mid-South and Southeast from these storms, click here.

A rash of tornadoes struck a swath of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska Monday, causing damage in at least three of those states as a severe weather outbreak began across the central and southern Plains. Flooding was reported in Missouri and Arkansas Tuesday as the storms marched east.

As of Wednesday, local National Weather Service offices had confirmed 27 tornadoes in Texas, Kansas, Nebraska and Oklahoma. A number of tornadoes reported during the outbreak have yet to be confirmed, and severe weather expert Dr. Greg Forbes estimates that a total of 34 tornadoes struck the four-state region.

The storms also brought strong non-tornadic winds to some areas, and in Texas and Oklahoma combined, some 47,000 customers woke up without power Tuesday morning. So far, there have been no injuries reported from these storms.

(FORECAST: Severe Weather Outbreak)

The damaging storms are developing on the warm side of Winter Storm Ajax, which brought blizzard conditions to the High Plains.

It's important to note that although the Storm Prediction Center listed 38 reports of tornadoes Monday, some of these reports may be duplicates or non-tornadic wind damage. The National Weather Service will investigate each tornado report in the coming days to determine whether the damage was caused by tornadoes or just straight-line winds.

Here is a roundup of damage reports and other storm-related impacts.

Texas

The National Weather Service in Amarillo confirmed eight Monday tornadoes in storm survey data released Tuesday.

Two tornadoes, both rated EF3, struck near Pampa. The twisters came from a pair of supercell thunderstorms that also dropped an EF2 tornado near Groom, Texas.

The National Weather Service said one of the Pampa tornadoes caused unspecified "major damage" as well as gas leaks and downed power lines on the south side of Pampa. Amarillo television station KAMR said via Twitter that two Gray County Sheriff deputies were sickened by the gas leak.

"We believe that they were just exposed to a natural gas leak," Gray County Chief Deputy Steven White said in an interview with The Weather Channel. "They reported a chemical smell which could've possibly been an oil additive, but we believe the actual hazard they were exposed to was a natural gas leak."

According to Gray County Emergency Coordinator Sandi Martin, chemical spills and gas leaks were contained after the Halliburton plant in Pampa was leveled in the storm. Nobody was inside the building at the time it was destroyed, ABC Amarillo reported. There were no injuries reported from this incident, KAMR-TV said.

"The Halliburton plant was a near total loss, and I know we've completely lost two residences in the county," White added. 

More than 1,000 Xcel Energy customers remained without power in the panhandle Tuesday morning.

A BNSF Railway train was derailed after a major storm in Roberts County, according to KVII-TV. Officials say the storm pushed the train off its tracks near Miami. Downed power lines in the area initially prevented emergency crews from reaching the scene of the accident.

Two tornadoes struck outside Perryton, followed by three more near Booker, Texas. Both communities are in the far northern part of the Panhandle near the Oklahoma border.

(PHOTOS: Tornado Outbreak in the Plains)

Large hail also affected parts of the Texas Panhandle. The tornadic thunderstorms in the Pampa area dropped golfball-size hail on the south side of Pampa. There were a few other reports of hail to the size of golfballs in rural areas of the Texas Panhandle.

The storms moved into the Dallas-Fort Worth area Tuesday morning – an area that has had its wettest year to-date. The nasty weather blew the roof off a building south of Weatherford around 2:45 a.m. The storms then moved into Tarrant County, including Fort Worth, where power line flashes were reported due to high winds in the city.

In Keller, north of Fort Worth, the National Weather Service confirmed a brief EF0 tornado touched down for about one minute during the wee hours of Tuesday morning. A second confirmed tornado struck the Hickory Creek and Corinth areas of Denton County; NWS rated it an EF1.

Emergency management officials said the storms overturned a tractor trailer in a parking lot near Lewisville, just northwest of Dallas, trapping the occupant. WFAA.com said there was widespread tree damage in one Hurst neighborhood. Several other towns in the area reported similar damage.

Power utility Oncor said some 44,000 customers were without power as of 4:40 a.m. CST Tuesday.

Oklahoma

At least three tornadoes were reported in Oklahoma; two of them moved into the state from Texas.

As noted above, a tornado that touched down in the far northern part of the Texas Panhandle then crossed into the Oklahoma Panhandle shortly before 7:30 p.m. CST south of Elmwood in Beaver County, according to spotter reports relayed by the National Weather Service in Amarillo, Texas.

Another tornado moved into Oklahoma from Texas about two hours later. Spotters saw the tornado 8 miles southwest of Slapout in Beaver County at 9:29 p.m. CST.

Around the same time, spotters reported a tornado 4 miles east of May after the pair of storms that had earlier produced tornadoes near Pampa, Texas, merged into a single supercell. There were additional tornado sightings from this cell in Harper County just southwest of Selman before it moved into Kansas.

Storms organized into a squall line west of Interstate 35 late Monday evening. As the line charged eastward, it produced a wind gust of 99 mph just east of Interstate 35 in Red Rock at 1:55 a.m. CST Tuesday. The website of power utility OG&E showed nearly 900 customers without power in nearby Billings shortly after the storms tore through.

As of 4:50 a.m. CST, nearly 7,000 OG&E customers lacked electricity; the Billings outage remained unresolved.

Public Service Company of Oklahoma reported about 500 customers without power just before 5 a.m. CST, mostly in northeast Oklahoma.

Kansas

A tornado that moved from Ensign to Howell Monday night was given a preliminary rating of EF2, the National Weather Service's Dodge City office said Tuesday.

The National Weather Service in Goodland confirmed six tornadoes in its area of responsibility. The office said they were the first documented tornadoes in northwest Kansas since reliable tornado records began in 1950.

In an unusual twist, the Goodland office said it would not go out in the field to survey the tornadoes in part because Winter Storm Ajax was bringing dangerous driving conditions to the region. The weather service also said many unpaved roads leading to tornado damage sites were nearly impassible because rain had made them muddy.

NWS Goodland used photos and media reports to assess the tornadoes' intensities. Two of the six northwest Kansas tornadoes were rated EF1, and the others EF0. One of the EF1 tornadoes struck areas near Grainfield, Kansas, along Interstate 70. That tornado damaged roofs, broke windows, destroyed sheds and downed power lines and trees along its path, which stretched 17 miles from Grainfield to near Tasco.

Several tornadoes also struck southwest Kansas. The National Weather Service in Dodge City has not yet finalized survey results or confirmations of those tornadoes, but it did post photos and preliminary intensity ratings to its Twitter feed Tuesday.

According NWS Dodge City, a storm chaser observed a tornado south of Ulysses just before 4 p.m. CST Monday. Local schools held their students until the system passed through. 

“The coast is clear and everyone was sent home, safe and sound. District coordinated with local emergency management officials, who determined the severe threat was over,” said superintendent of Ulysses Public Schools Dave Younger. No injuries or substantial damage were reported.

Emergency management reported a tornado 11 miles north of Pierceville in Finney County at 5:19 p.m. CST.

(MORE: Flood Threat Looms for Gulf Coast, Mississippi Valley)

Just before 6 p.m. CST a large tornado was also reported near Kismet, and debris was reported in the air near Hayne, according to the National Weather Service in Dodge City. A residence and several hog farms were damaged outside of Kismet, where the tornado was estimated at a quarter-mile wide by a storm chaser.

The NWS rated this tornado EF3 in its preliminary survey of the damage left behind.

KAMR-TV in Amarillo said a hog farm and mobile home in Seward County were destroyed by the tornado. A roof was ripped off of a house and a separate garage was damaged in the same area. The families affected were able to take shelter, and no injuries were reported.

At 6:29 p.m., the National Weather Service said "a large tornado continues and is very well defined from observers" 8 miles north-northwest of Missler from the same cell that produced the tornado near Kismet. It is not immediately clear whether the tornado had been on the ground continuously since hitting the Kismet area.

A tornado was reported by a spotter at 6:44 p.m. just west of Ransom, Kansas. National Weather Service radar detected a tornado debris signature in the area. That tornado knocked down 17 or 18 power poles near Arnold, Kansas, and was later spotted north of Cedar Bluff around 7 p.m.

In southwest Kansas, a tornado damaged a barn near Montezuma at 6:45 p.m. It may have been the same tornado later blamed for damaging a residence near Howell in Ford County. Between those damage incidents, the twister was spotted by law enforcement just north of Ensign at 7:06 p.m. CST.

At 7:39 p.m. CST, law enforcement and a firefighting unit reported two "rope" tornadoes in rural Hodgeman County about 11 miles east of Kalvesta.

A tornado that was spotted in Harper County, Oklahoma, crossed the state line and damaged two homes in rural Comanche County, Kansas, around 10:20 p.m., according to law enforcement reports relayed by the National Weather Service in Dodge City.

There were several reports of golfball-size hail across western Kansas, according to NWS reports. Hail up to 2 inches in diameter, slightly larger than golf balls, cracked a vehicle's windshield north of Pierceville.

Nebraska

The National Weather Service in Hastings said a spotter reported a tornado 5 miles southwest of Stamford in rural Furnas County at 7:51 p.m. CST.

The agency later confirmed it as an EF1 tornado, saying it damaged trees, power poles, signs, a barn and small farm machinery. The tornado began its journey just south of the state line in Norton County, Kansas.

Farther east, severe thunderstorm produced winds strong enough to damage trees on a golf course near Wahoo, according to the National Weather Service in Omaha.