An extremely rare wintertime tornado outbreak affected the Midwestern United States on January 24, 1967. Of the 30 confirmed tornadoes, 13 occurred in Iowa, nine in Missouri, seven in Illinois, and one in Wisconsin. The outbreak produced, at the time, the northernmost tornado to hit the United States in winter, in Wisconsin, until January 7, 2008. The tornadoes formed ahead of a deep storm system in which several temperature records were broken. The deadliest and most damaging tornado of the outbreak struck Greater St. Louis at F4 intensity, killing three people and injuring 216.
From April 2–3, 1956, a large, deadly tornado outbreak affected the Great Plains, parts of the South, and the upper Midwest in the contiguous United States, especially the Great Lakes region. The outbreak produced at least 55 tornadoes, including an F5 that devastated the Grand Rapids metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Michigan on April 3. It was one of three tornadoes to move across southwest Lower Michigan on that day. A fourth tornado struck north of the Manistee area, in the northern part of the peninsula. The Hudsonville–Standale tornado killed 18 and injured 333. It remains the fourth deadliest tornado on record in Michigan and is the most recent F5 on record there. Several other deadly, intense, long-tracked tornadoes also occurred during the outbreak. In addition to the fatalities in Kansas, Oklahoma, Michigan and Berlin, Wisconsin, three people were killed in Tennessee, one person in Kentucky and two more people in Wisconsin. In total, 39 were killed during the entire event.
From May 4–10, 1933, a tornado outbreak sequence produced at least 33 tornadoes. Among them was the Beaty Swamp tornado, a violent F4 that struck shortly after midnight CST on May 11, 1933, in Overton County, Tennessee, killing 35 people, injuring 150 others, and devastating the unincorporated communities of Beaty Swamp and Bethsaida. The storm was the second-deadliest tornado in the history of Middle Tennessee, even though it struck a sparsely populated, rural area. The community of Beaty Swamp ceased to exist and does not appear on any current maps. The only landmark that alludes to the former community is Beaty Swamp Road, which intersects Highway 111 in the northeast corner of Overton County. The severe weather event that generated the tornado also produced others, including long-tracked, intense tornadoes or tornado families that devastated portions of Alabama, South Carolina, and Kentucky, killing a combined total of 76 people.
Forestburg is an unincorporated community in Montague County, Texas, United States. According to the Handbook of Texas, the community had a population of 50 in 2000.
A destructive severe weather episode affected portions of the Midwestern and Southern United States from April 30–May 2, 1967. It consisted of two consecutive tornado outbreaks that generated at least 38 tornadoes, causing 13 fatalities and 90 injuries. All of the deaths occurred on April 30, which is known as the 1967 Iowa–Minnesota tornado outbreak, or Black Sunday, to residents of Iowa and southern Minnesota. That day spawned a total of 21 tornadoes, devastating the towns of Albert Lea and Waseca, Minnesota.
On Monday, April 8, 1957, a widespread tornado outbreak struck the Southeastern United States, particularly the Carolinas, and was responsible for seven deaths and 203 injuries across the region. Most of the activity occurred on either side of the Piedmont, including portions of the Cumberland Plateau. At least 18 tornadoes occurred, including several long-tracked tornado families, one of which included a violent tornado that was retrospectively rated F4 on the Fujita scale. Besides tornadoes, the outbreak also generated other severe weather phenomena such as large hail.
On April 2–5, 1957, a deadly tornado outbreak sequence struck most of the Southern United States. The outbreak killed at least 21 people across three states and produced at least 73 tornadoes from Texas to Virginia. The outbreak was most notable due to a tornado that hit a densely populated area of the Dallas–Fort Worth metropolitan area, killing 10 people and injuring 200 or more. The tornado, highly visible for most of its path, was at the time the most observed and best-documented tornado in recorded history; hundreds of people photographed or filmed the F3 tornado as it moved just west of Downtown Dallas. The film of this tornado is still known for its unusually high quality and sharpness, considering the photography techniques and technology of the 1950s. Damage from the Dallas tornado reached as high as $4 million. Besides the famous Dallas tornado, other deadly tornadoes struck portions of Mississippi, Texas, and Oklahoma. Two F4 tornadoes struck southern Oklahoma on April 2, killing five people. Three other significant, F2-rated tornadoes that day killed two people in Texas and one more in Oklahoma. An F3 tornado struck rural Mississippi on April 4, killing one more person.
On April 21–24, 1968, a deadly tornado outbreak struck portions of the Midwestern United States, primarily along the Ohio River Valley. The worst tornado was an F5 that struck portions of Southeastern Ohio from Wheelersburg to Gallipolis, just north of the Ohio–Kentucky state line, killing seven people and injuring at least 93. Another long-tracked violent tornado killed six people, injured 364 others, and produced possible F5 damage as it tracked along the Ohio River. At least one other violent tornado caused an additional fatality and 33 injuries in Ohio. In the end, at least 26 tornadoes touched down, leaving 14 dead, including five in Kentucky and nine in Ohio.
On March 21–22, 1952, a severe tornado outbreak generated eleven violent tornadoes across the Southern United States, which is the fourth-largest number of F4–F5 events produced by a single outbreak. Only the 1965 Palm Sunday tornado outbreak, the 1974 Super Outbreak, and the 2011 Super Outbreak surpassed this number. The outbreak caused 209 fatalities–50 of which occurred in a single tornado in Arkansas. In addition, this tornado outbreak is the deadliest on record to ever affect the state of Tennessee, with 64 of the fatalities associated with this outbreak occurring in the state; this surpasses the 60 fatalities from a tornado outbreak in 1909, and well ahead of both the 1974 Super Outbreak and the Super Tuesday tornado outbreak in terms of tornado fatalities. The severe weather event also resulted in the fourth-largest number of tornado fatalities within a 24-hour period since 1950.
On February 21–22, 1971, a devastating tornado outbreak, colloquially known as the Mississippi Delta outbreak, struck portions of the Lower Mississippi and Ohio River valleys in the Southern and Midwestern United States. The outbreak generated strong tornadoes from Texas to Ohio and North Carolina. The two-day severe weather episode produced at least 19 tornadoes, and probably several more, mostly brief events in rural areas; killed 123 people across three states; and wrecked entire communities in the state of Mississippi. The strongest tornado of the outbreak was an F5 that developed in Louisiana and crossed into Mississippi, killing 47 people, while the deadliest was an F4 that tracked across Mississippi and entered Tennessee, causing 58 fatalities in the former state. The former tornado remains the only F5 on record in Louisiana, while the latter is the deadliest on record in Mississippi since 1950. A deadly F4 also affected other parts of Mississippi, causing 13 more deaths. Other deadly tornadoes included a pair of F3s—one each in Mississippi and North Carolina, respectively—that collectively killed five people.
On March 16–17, 1942, a deadly late-winter tornado outbreak struck a large area of the Central and Southern United States. The tornado outbreak killed 149 people and injured at least 1,312. At least five states reported violent tornadoes, from Illinois and Indiana south to Mississippi, beginning with an F4 tornado in the morning in Illinois. Intense activity spread south to the Gulf Coast and north to the Michigan–Indiana border as the day went on. Seven violent tornadoes were reported, one of which was a powerful F5 in Illinois. A long-tracked F4 tornado family in Mississippi claimed 63 lives as well, becoming the deadliest tornado of the outbreak. Another long-lived F4 in Tennessee killed 15 more people, and a series of intense tornadoes caused 23 other deaths in Kentucky. The outbreak also produced 18 tornadoes that caused at least one death, one of the highest such totals for a single outbreak.
On April 4–5, 1966, an outbreak of at least three tornadoes affected portions of Florida and North Carolina. It included a deadly pair of tornado families that struck the I-4 corridor in Central Florida from the Tampa Bay Area to Brevard County. At least two long-tracked tornadoes affected the region, each of which featured a path length in excess of 100 mi (160 km). The two tornadoes are officially listed as continuous events, but the tornadoes' damage paths did not cross the entire state, and downbursts may have been responsible for destruction near Lake Juliana and in the Kissimmee–Saint Cloud area. However, tornado and downburst damage combined was continuous from coast to coast.
Beaver Dam is an unincorporated community in Bowie County, in the U.S. state of Texas. According to the Handbook of Texas, the community had a population of 55 in 2000. It is located within the Texarkana metropolitan area.
A deadly tornado outbreak devastated parts of Louisiana and Tennessee on February 11–13, 1950. The outbreak covered about a day and a half and produced numerous tornadoes, mostly from East Texas to the lower Mississippi Valley, with activity concentrated in Texas and Louisiana. Most of the deaths occurred in Louisiana and Tennessee, where tornadoes killed 25 and nine people, respectively. Several long-lived tornado families struck the Red River region of northwestern Louisiana, especially the Shreveport–Bossier City area. One of the tornadoes attained violent intensity, F4, on the Fujita scale and caused eight deaths, including six at the Shreveport Holding and Reconsignment Depot near Barksdale Air Force Base. It remains one of the top ten deadliest tornadoes on record in the state of Louisiana, in tenth place. Also in Louisiana, two other destructive tornadoes on parallel paths killed 16. Seven additional deaths occurred across the border in East Texas. Nine people died in a tornado in western Tennessee as well. In all, the entire outbreak killed at least 41 people and left 228 injured. Also, several long-tracked tornadoes recorded in the outbreak likely contained more, shorter-lived tornadoes.
From April 2–3, 1982, a major tornado outbreak resulted in over 60 tornadoes and 30 fatalities, primarily over portions of Northeast Texas and Southwest Arkansas, as well as Southeastern Oklahoma. Three of the tornadoes were rated F4, and one officially was recorded as an F5 near Broken Bow, Oklahoma, all on April 2. Beginning on April 2, a series of tornado-producing supercells formed across portions of northeastern Texas and southeastern Oklahoma. One produced an F5 tornado, the first since April 4, 1977, which crossed mostly rural areas near Speer and Broken Bow, and deposited a motel sign from Broken Bow 30 miles (48 km) away in Arkansas. The F5 tornado resulted in no fatalities, but an F4 tornado in Paris, Texas, resulted in 10 fatalities and 170 injuries. Additionally, the Storm Prediction Center, known then as the Severe Local Storms Unit, issued its first officially documented high risk on April 2 as well as the first tornado watch to contain the wording Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS).
This page documents the tornadoes and tornado outbreaks of 1954, primarily in the United States. Most tornadoes form in the U.S., although some events may take place internationally. Tornado statistics for older years like this often appear significantly lower than modern years due to fewer reports or confirmed tornadoes.
On November 7–8, 1957, a significant tornado outbreak affected portions of the Southern United States, particularly the Golden Triangle of Southeast Texas and parts of Acadiana in Louisiana. The severe weather event inflicted 12 deaths and more than 200 injuries, especially in the vicinity of Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas. The most intense tornado of the outbreak, retrospectively rated F4 on the Fujita scale, struck the town of Orange, Texas, killing one person, injuring 81 others, and causing $11⁄2 million in losses. The deadliest tornado of the outbreak was an F3 that killed four people northwest of Carencro, Louisiana. The costliest tornado of the outbreak, also rated F3, caused $2.3 million in losses in the town of Groves, Texas, killing a few people there. Other intense tornadoes occurred as far east as Mississippi and North Carolina. In all, at least 28 tornadoes were confirmed, yet others were likely present as well.
