WEIMAR, Texas – When there are reports that a tornado has touched down, it's not officially a tornado until the National Weather Service says it is.
The Weimar storm of Thursday night has now officially been declared at least an EF-1 in strength on the Enhanced Fujita scale, meaning there was a tornado with winds of between 86 and 110 mph.
Dan Reilly, the warning coordination meteorologist for the Houston/Galveston office of the NWS, spent several hours Friday with Charles Rogers, Weimar's director of emergency management, surveying the damage.
Reilly said there were several indications that Thursday's storm was EF-1 strength.
"Most of the damage we saw was a lot of twisted limb damage, indicative of tornadic action", he said. "Rather than the straight-line (wind) type of damage that might be caused by microbursts or downdrafts."
While the official measurements have not been made, Reilly says Thursday's twister was a wide and relatively slow-moving storm that could certainly be a borderline EF-3 storm, meaning that it had winds between 111 and 135 miles an hour.
"The reason I'd at least consider it to be an EF-3 is because of the way the wind was able to toss railroad cars off the tracks and in a circular pattern," said Riley.
He said he should have a final analysis within the next two days.
City manager Randal Jones said that while the super cell developed too quickly for them to react, he is grateful there was not more damage and that so few people were hurt with minor injuries.
Jones said that if the twister had stayed on the ground for a half-mile more, it would have hit a retirement home and that "we might be having a much different conversation."