This page documents the tornadoes and tornado outbreaks of 1938, primarily in the United States. Most tornadoes form in the U.S., although some events may take place internationally. Tornado statistics for older years like this often appear significantly lower than modern years due to fewer reports or confirmed tornadoes. Also, prior to 1950, tornadoes were not officially surveyed by the U.S. Weather Bureau, which would later become the National Weather Service, and thus had no official rating. All documented significant tornadoes were instead given unofficial ratings by tornado experts like Thomas P. Grazulis.
Prior to 1990, there is a likely undercount of tornadoes, particularly E/F0–1, with reports of weaker tornadoes becoming more common as population increased. A sharp increase in the annual average E/F0–1 count by approximately 200 tornadoes was noted upon the implementation of NEXRADDoppler weather radar in 1990–1991.[1][note 1] 1974 marked the first year where significant tornado (E/F2+) counts became homogenous with contemporary values, attributed to the consistent implementation of Fujita scale assessments.[5][note 2]
A violent, 7-mile-long (11 km) F4 tornado obliterated much of Rodessa, Louisiana, after sunset on February 17, killing 21 people and injuring 50. Small, frail homes were blown away and oil derricks mangled. Machinery and parts of automobiles were piled up or carried many miles. Human bodies were also mutilated by corrugated metal debris. A predawn F2 tornado the same day tracked 4 mi (6.4 km) from Mertzon to Sherwood, Texas, injuring 24 people and leaving 100 homeless. About 24 structures were destroyed or unroofed in its path. On February 19 an F1 tornado, skipping between touchdowns, collapsed a small home near Live Oak, Alabama, south of Petrey, crushing to death a four-year-old girl beneath a fallen chimney. The tornado only hit twice, each 3 mi (4.8 km) apart.[13][14]
Two deadly F4s in all killed 20 people—10 each—and injured 72: a state-crossing tornado family on the Arkansas–Missouri border that injured 60, annihilating small homes near Bakerville, and another event in Belleville, Illinois, that wrecked 60 homes, many of them large that were obliterated. A pair of long-lived F2 families tracked across parts of eastern Missouri, one of which entered Illinois, and killed a few people.[13][15]
^Historically, the number of tornadoes globally and in the United States was and is likely underrepresented: research by Grazulis on annual tornado activity suggests that, as of 2001, only 53% of yearly U.S. tornadoes were officially recorded. Documentation of tornadoes outside the United States was historically less exhaustive, owing to the lack of monitors in many nations and, in some cases, to internal political controls on public information.[2] Most countries only recorded tornadoes that produced severe damage or loss of life.[3] Significant low biases in U.S. tornado counts likely occurred through the early 1990s, when advanced NEXRAD was first installed and the National Weather Service began comprehensively verifying tornado occurrences.[4]
^The Fujita scale was devised under the aegis of scientist T. Theodore Fujita in the early 1970s. Prior to the advent of the scale in 1971, tornadoes in the United States were officially unrated.[6][7] Tornado ratings were retroactively applied to events prior to the formal adoption of the F-scale by the National Weather Service.[8] While the Fujita scale has been superseded by the Enhanced Fujita scale in the U.S. since February 1, 2007,[9] Canada used the old scale until April 1, 2013;[10] nations elsewhere, like the United Kingdom, apply other classifications such as the TORRO scale.[11]
^Edwards, Roger (March 5, 2015). "Enhanced F Scale for Tornado Damage". The Online Tornado FAQ (by Roger Edwards, SPC). Storm Prediction Center. Retrieved February 25, 2016.
