For the second time in two weeks, the state of Oklahoma has seen its second EF5 rated tornado.
After additional surveying and studying of weather data, including the use of information from mobile Doppler radar, the National Weather Service in Norman, Okla. has upgraded the May 31 tornado near El Reno, Okla. to an EF5. This is the highest possible rating a tornado can be given.
In addition, the width of the tornado has been given a "conservative" estimate of 2.6 miles. This is a new record for the widest tornado in history, beating the previous record of 2.5 miles near Hallam, Neb. on May 22, 2004.
The El Reno tornado is the same one that killed three storm chasers on Friday and injured the crew of our own Tornado Hunt team.
This is the second EF5 rated tornado in Oklahoma in a matter of weeks. An EF5 tornado devastated nearby Moore, Okla. on May 20, 2013.
In a web conference held Tuesday, Rick Smith, warning coordination meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Norman, Okla., noted that this tornado was exceptional in many ways.
The massive tornado contained several powerful "subvortices," areas of extremely rapid rotation that swirled within the larger tornadic circulation. These subvortices contained the strongest wind speeds measured within the tornado, greater than 295 miles per hour in several different instances -- well above the 201-mph minimum requirement for a EF5 designation.
Not only did these subvortices contain almost unfathomable winds, but they were moving forward at incredible speeds, making them impossible to outrun.
"Think of the average size of an Oklahoma tornado you'd see on a typical afternoon - three or four of those things moving along the ground at a speed of 170 to 180 miles per hour, crossing each other with all kinds of violent motions going on," Smith remarked. "So this is going to be studied for a long time."
Smith later noted that a few of these vortices may have been moving along the ground at a jaw-dropping forward speed of 185 miles per hour, even as the parent tornado lumbered along at a forward speed of about 24 miles per hour.
"This was an incredible storm," Smith said. "The storm that produced this tornado was doing some phenomenal things."