WENTZVILLE • The National Weather Service confirmed Tuesday that it was a weak tornado — not straight line winds — that hit Wentzville about midnight Monday, injuring two people and damaging homes and businesses.
A tornado also hit Oak Grove, Mo., near Kansas City, where nearly 500 homes and commercial buildings were damaged. Gov. Eric Greitens toured the area Tuesday and declared a state of emergency for the Missouri areas hit by storms Monday night.
The National Weather Service says the tornado that hit Oak Grove was an EF3 with an estimated peak wind of 152 mph.
An EF2 tornado hit Smithville, Mo., where 60-70 homes were damaged, and EF1 tornadoes struck Wentzville, Lee’s Summit and Macks Creek, Mo.
Wentzville police at first thought the damage resulted from straight line winds from Hepperman Road to Continental Drive and East Pearce Boulevard.
The St. Charles County Division of Emergency Management, which is responsible for sounding the outdoor warning sirens, didn’t sound them for several reasons.
The agency’s operations coordinator, Ina Obenland, said the National Weather Service had not issued a tornado warning and there were no radar indications of a tornado and no sightings of a tornado on the ground by trained spotters, first responders or others.
“We had no indication a tornado was on the ground,” Obenland said.
Kevin Deitsch, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Weldon Spring, said the twister also caught that agency by surprise.
“We didn’t have a tornado warning on it,” Deitsch said. “It was a just quick-developing system. Our radar didn’t have a great look at it.”
Deitsch said the meteorologists will be analyzing what happened and their response, to see if they can prevent it from happening again.
“We do that a lot,” he said. “That’s how you learn.”
The tornado touched down about 11:51 p.m. Monday and ended about three minutes later, the Weather Service says.
The EF1 tornado in Wentzville had 98 mph winds. As the storm moved east, St. Peters reported some trees down and tree limbs in the road, as well as siding damage at an apartment complex. Farther east, in St. Charles, there was a minimal number of power outages.
The short duration of the tornado, the fact that it was wrapped in rain and the dark may have contributed to the difficulty in spotting it, Obenland said.
The area had been under a tornado watch for much of the night, but never a tornado warning, Obenland said. She said this illustrates why residents should always be aware that a severe thunderstorm can produce a tornado at any time. Rapid onset of a tornado, she said, is one of the characteristics of a severe thunderstorm.
At Wentzville Mobile Manor, a mobile home park off of West Main Street, Sandra Orr and her husband, Mike Orr, were taken to a hospital after being injured when their mobile home overturned. Police said the injuries were minor.
“It was really loud,” Sandra Orr said. “Next thing we knew, all hell broke loose.”
The storm also caused a gas leak that led to the evacuation of residents in the mobile home park.
A fifth-wheel vehicle overturned at a camper company, and several buildings sustained structural damage on Swantnerville Road and at Wentzville Millworks. A tractor-trailer overturned at the Super 8 Motel, and several buildings had roof damage near Continental Drive and East Pitman. In addition, there was minor damage to commercial buildings at West Pearce and Choctaw Drive.
An EF1 on a scale of tornado strength has winds of 86 mph to 110 mph. By comparison, the tornado in Perryville, Mo., that killed one motorist Feb. 28 and damaged dozens of homes was classified as an EF-4, with winds reaching 180 mph.
The storms that rolled through the St. Louis region on Monday night and early Tuesday also downed trees and power lines in Jefferson County and produced large hail in Macoupin County, according to the National Weather Service.
The Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., says it received 32 reports of tornadoes late Monday and early Tuesday in Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Illinois. Powerful winds extended as far south as the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas, where a post office and church were damaged, and as far north as Wisconsin, where trees were downed.
By Kim Bell • St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Mar 8, 2017
