Oklahoma tornado was strongest category: weather official

May 22, 2013 | 09:59

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The massive tornado that cut a wide and deadly swath through a suburban Oklahoma City town was a top category EF5 system with winds over 200 mph (321 kmh), a weather official told AFP Tuesday.

An aerial view of destroyed houses and buildings in Moore, Oklahoma.
(Benjamin Krain/Getty Images/AFP)

WASHINGTON: The massive tornado that cut a wide and deadly swath through a suburban Oklahoma City town was a top category EF5 system with winds over 200 mph (321 kmh), a weather official told AFP Tuesday.

"It's an EF5," the most powerful tornado classification, said Kelly Pirtle of the NOAA national Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma, of the wedge tornado that struck Moore, Oklahoma on Monday.

"We have looked at the damage, and estimated wind speeds, and they've determined that the damage is EF5," she added by phone from Norman.

That means the system, which blew homes off their foundations and sent debris flying almost 100 miles away, had "maximum winds over 200 miles per hour," Pirtle explained.

Rescue teams were still combing through a blasted moonscape that had been Moore after the monstrous tornado struck south of Oklahoma City, killing at least 24 people.

Nine children were among the dead and entire neighbourhoods were obliterated.

AFP

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