A tornado that tore through southeastern North Dakota this summer has been confirmed as an EF5 — the highest rating on the Enhanced Fujita scale — with winds reaching 210 mph (338 kph).
The violent storm struck near the town of Enderlin on June 20, carving a 12-mile (19 km) path across the prairie, at times more than a mile wide. Three people were killed east of the town, while Enderlin itself largely avoided serious damage apart from power outages.
The National Weather Service released its final assessment on Monday, saying the tornado’s classification was raised from EF3 to EF5 after weeks of forensic analysis. The upgrade came after experts studied extreme destruction, including uprooted trees, collapsed transmission towers, fully loaded rail cars thrown from tracks, and farmsteads swept clean to their foundations.
“It’s hard sometimes to get tornadoes to hit something,” said Melinda Beerends, meteorologist in charge at the Grand Forks office. “In this case, the damage indicators gave us the evidence to support the EF5 rating.”
The twister marks the first EF5 tornado in the United States since May 2013, when a storm near Moore, Oklahoma, killed 24 people and injured more than 200. Since the adoption of the Enhanced Fujita scale in 2007, only 10 tornadoes have been classified as EF5.
Scientists say tornado activity is shifting away from the traditional “Tornado Alley” states such as Oklahoma and Kansas. In recent decades, more powerful storms have been recorded farther east in places like Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi — regions closer to dense population centers.
Victor Gensini, a professor of atmospheric sciences at Northern Illinois University, said the trend raises the risk of deadly tornadoes striking major cities. “We’re seeing more tornadoes in places like Birmingham, Little Rock, and Memphis,” he noted.
The strongest winds ever recorded in a U.S. tornado remain those of the 1999 Bridge Creek–Moore storm in Oklahoma, which reached 321 mph (517 kph).
The EF5 confirmation highlights both the rarity and destructive force of top-scale tornadoes. Weather experts continue to study shifting storm patterns to better predict future risks.
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