The widest tornado ever recorded is the 2013 El Reno tornado, which reached a peak width of 2.6 miles. It struck rural areas of central Oklahoma near El Reno on May 31. The tornado was roughly the width of the island of Manhattan from river to river. It easily surpassed the previous U.S. record set by the 2.5-mile-wide 2004 Hallam, Nebraska, tornado. Mobile Doppler radar measured winds of at least 296 mph, with some analyses estimating gusts up to 313 mph. Despite having the wind speeds typical of an EF5 tornado, the National Weather Service officially rated it an EF3. Because the storm traveled most over open farmland, those extreme winds didn’t strike well-built structures needed to confirm higher damage ratings. The massive, rain-wrapped tornado was a multiple vortex tornado containing smaller, intense suction tornadoes rotating inside the main circulation. It stayed on the ground for 40 minutes and carved an erratic 16.2 mile path. The tornado killed 8 people and injured 151. It became the first tornado in history to kill storm chasers, claiming the lives of veteran researcher Tim Samaras, his son Paul, and meteorologist Carl Young.
