1970 Lubbock tornado
| F5 tornado | |
|---|---|
| Formed | May 11, 1970 9:35 pm |
| Max rating1 | F5 tornado |
| Damage | $1.54 billion (2013 Dollars) |
| Casualties | 26 fatalities, approximately 500 injuries |
| Areas affected | Central Lubbock, Texas |
| 1Most severe tornado damage; see Fujita scale | |
The 1970 Lubbock tornado was a tornado event that occurred in Lubbock, Texas, on May 11, 1970. It was one of the worst tornadoes in Texas history, and occurred exactly 17 years to the day after the deadly Waco Tornado. It is also the most recent F5 tornado to have struck a central business district of a large city.
At 10 am on 11 May 1970, the SELS (Severe Local Storms unit) issued an outlook that stated that isolated thunderstorms were possible in the High Plains region of West Texas, and amended the outlook at 1:25 pm to include the possibility that some of the storms may become severe. Warm and dry conditions dominated the area throughout the afternoon; the temperature peaked at a high of 90 °F (32 °C) with moderate humidity. At 6 pm, large cumulus clouds began to appear in the area, and at 6:30 the first echoes indicating thunderstorms began to appear on radar scopes in nearby Amarillo. Less than half an hour later, Lubbock radar indicated the first thunderstorm activity in the immediate Lubbock vicinity: a moderate storm just south of the city near the small farming community of Woodrow.
Conditions continued to deteriorate through the early evening, and at 7:30 the local weather bureau issued a forecast which included the developing thunderstorm activity. By 7:45 the thunderstorm south of the city was indicated by radar to be increasing in intensity, and at 7:50 the National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm warning for Lubbock, Crosby and Floyd counties. Shortly afterward, reports of rapidly deteriorating conditions on the south side of the city of Lubbock began to come into the weather bureau and by 8:05, citizens south of the city were reporting golf ball-sized hail to the bureau.
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