A large
tornado bore down on Wichita’s Mid-Continent Airport long after sunset Saturday
night, taking a path that would bring it right through downtown — where country
music star Miranda Lambert was performing at Entrust Bank Arena.
The
tornado drew so close to the airport that the staff of the Wichita branch of
the National Weather Service, which is next to the airport, turned operational
duties over to the Topeka office and sought shelter.
Then it
lifted.
Even as
that twister fell apart, a new tornado was developing farther to the east. It
would churn through Oaklawn, south Wichita and into Butler County, causing
damage estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars but no fatalities or
critical injuries.
“It could
have been so much worse,” said Chance Hayes, warning coordination meteorologist
for the weather service’s Wichita branch.
A damage
survey team rated the Wichita tornado an EF3 on Sunday, meaning it had maximum
winds of up to 165 mph. The most significant damage was found in Oaklawn and on
the west side of McConnell Air Force Base. The team was continuing to assess
the damage path late Sunday afternoon.
Another
survey team rated a central Kansas tornado EF4 — with winds of more than 166
mph — for damage left behind at a farmstead near Kannapolis Lake in Ellsworth
County.
A third team
went to southern Kansas to chart the paths of tornadoes from the Oklahoma state
line south of Anthony to Clearwater.
It could
be several days before officials know just how many tornadoes touched down in
Kansas during Saturday’s outbreak. The Storm Prediction Center logged 97
reports of tornadoes in Kansas.
“The
environmental conditions were favorable for super cells to produce long-track
tornadoes,” said Bill Bunting, chief of the operations branch at the Storm
Prediction Center.
That
doesn’t mean one tornado stayed on the ground for hours at a time, however.
More than one super cell thunderstorm in Kansas produced multiple tornadoes as
they moved across the state.
The super
cell thunderstorm that generated the Wichita tornado began producing tornadoes
in Oklahoma more than two hours before arriving in Wichita and continued to
develop tornadoes long after the storm had moved into the Flint Hills.
“It may
take a few days to get a really comprehensive picture of the exact track and
the intensity of the tornadoes,” Bunting said.
Forecasters
say the tornado storm caused localized flooding of streets and basements,
though few reports were made to the weather service.
“I’m sure
everyone was more concerned about the tornado,” said Robb Lawson, a
meteorologist with the weather service.
Radar
indicated the storm also brought large hail to the metropolitan area, Lawson
said, but almost no hail reports were called in.
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100 reports of tornadoes in Kansas |
![]() |
100 reports of tornadoes in Kansas |
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