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For me Jarrell and Hackleburg would be close in the 97 or 98 range. IMO Hackleburg is the closest re-incarnation of the tri-state tornado we have seen to date. While the Hackleburg tornado may not have produced damage as violent as Jarrell the shear volume of EF5 damage it did was absurd. It was at EF5 level for much of its very long path.

It's interesting to note that a tornado on April 20, 1920, affected many of the same locations in Alabama as the 4/27/11 Hackleburg tornado. The 1920 tornado began in Oktibbeha County, MS, and likely dissipated in Limestone County. There is some evidence it continued into Tennessee. However, it devastated Hackleburg, Phil Campbell, and numerous other small towns in Marion, Franklin, Colbert, and Lawrence counties. This tornado was rated an F-4, had a path length of at least 130 miles, and killed 88. It could have been a tornado family, but we will never know for certain.
 
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It's interesting to note that a tornado on April 20, 1920, affected many of the same locations in Alabama as the 4/27/11 Hackleburg tornado. The 1920 tornado began in Oktibbeha County, MS, and likely dissipated in Limestone County. There is some evidence it continued into Tennessee. However, it devastated Hackleburg, Phil Campbell, and numerous other small towns in Marion, Franklin, Colbert, and Lawrence counties. This tornado was rated an F-4, had a path length of at least 130 miles, and killed 88. It could have been a tornado family, but we will never know for certain.
It's path is also not that far off from the Guin, AL storm from 1974. The April 1920 outbreak is very similar to 4/27/11 in so many ways, from geographic extent to tornado intensity and duration.
 
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There were a few tornadoes in 2004 that really stood out there. This is one of them. There was also a tornado on July 18, 2004 in Barnes County, ND that practically did F5 damage. It was actually considered for an F5 rating but was settled on a very high-end F4. I can't find any damage from that tornado anymore. Also the Harper County, Kansas tornado should definitely have been rated F5. Like I said 2004 had some very violent tornadoes.
Found some damage pics of it:


This link has lots of information on studies done on that oubreak: http://umanitoba.ca/environment/envirogeog/weather/ndtornadoes04.html
 
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It's interesting to note that a tornado on April 20, 1920, affected many of the same locations in Alabama as the 4/27/11 Hackleburg tornado. The 1920 tornado began in Oktibbeha County, MS, and likely dissipated in Limestone County. There is some evidence it continued into Tennessee. However, it devastated Hackleburg, Phil Campbell, and numerous other small towns in Marion, Franklin, Colbert, and Lawrence counties. This tornado was rated an F-4, had a path length of at least 130 miles, and killed 88. It could have been a tornado family, but we will never know for certain.
Here's some PDFs with information on the outbreak. Part 2 contains the information on the Hackleburg-like tornado:

1. https://web.archive.org/web/2016030....noaa.gov/rescue/mwr/048/mwr-048-04-0203b.pdf

2. https://web.archive.org/web/2015040...b.noaa.gov/rescue/mwr/048/mwr-048-04-0205.pdf
 
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Some impressive footage of Red Rock and some of its damage can be seen near the end. God I would love to find the whole damage survey of this thing:

 
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The NWS in Little Rock blatantly ignored many potential spots of EF5 damage and there was at least one known area that had EF5 damage. I bet they didn't even survey the damage in Mayflower. The more I see the damage from this tornado the more and more furious I get.
Other runner ups would be Chapman, Goldsby, and Chickasha but Vilonia was the most blatantly ignored of all them.
 

buckeye05

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The first two pictures continue the pictures above which mainly around Vilonia. The rest was in Mayflower.
View attachment 3551View attachment 3552View attachment 3553View attachment 3554View attachment 3555View attachment 3556View attachment 3557
Completely and utterly ridiculous mis-use of the EF scale due to arrogant personal bias and the lead surveyor having an agenda. I'm not even convinced that the E Wicker St home was the only one with anchor bolts. Several of these slabbed homes are simply skipped and ignored on the DAT, which is HIGHLY suspicious.
 
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Completely and utterly ridiculous mis-use of the EF scale due to arrogant personal bias and the lead surveyor having an agenda. I'm not even convinced that the E Wicker St home was the only one with anchor bolts. Several of these slabbed homes are simply skipped and ignored on the DAT, which is HIGHLY suspicious.
Why would they go to such great lengths to not rate this tornado an EF5? Are they really that arrogant? No EF5 this time and there never will be one in our area ever again.
 
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Why would they go to such great lengths to not rate this tornado an EF5? Are they really that arrogant? No EF5 this time and there never will be one in our area ever again.
To the best of my knowledge Arkansas is the only state east of the Rockies not to have had a tornado ranked F5 or EF5 in its entire history. Really interesting, especially considering the sheer amount of violent tornadoes it's had.
 
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