2024 tornado season was 2nd worst on record, driven by hurricanes
Unusually high activity in May, hurricane-spawned tornadoes and a late December outbreak have helped make the 2024 tornado season the worst tornado season in 13 years.
Tony Laubach and Geoff Cornish go over the 2024 tornado season that brought over 1,800 tornadoes to the U.S.
The year 2024 will go down in history as the second-worst tornado season on record, beating 2011, NOAA's Storm Prediction Center's said Friday. After a late December tornado outbreak with at least 88 twisters, 1,735 tornadoes have been confirmed so far in the United States from 1,880 preliminary reports during the year. That number could change slightly as reports from the December outbreak continue this week.
Records go back to 1950. Both numbers are far above the 14-year mean of 1,390.
A total of 53 people were killed by tornadoes in 2024, which is one-tenth of the fatalities in 2011, a year marked by many strong, deadly tornadoes in the southeast United States. Last year had the most EF2 or stronger tornadoes since 2011.
3 surprising state tornado numbers
For the second year in a row, the highest state tornado counts have returned to the "classic" Tornado Alley, according to preliminary SPC reports. Texas has the country's largest tornado count this year, with 169 twisters reported. Due to its size and location in a tornado-prone part of the country, Texas is often number one, and tornadoes from Hurricane Beryl helped secure that first-place spot in 2024.
The second-highest state number is 131, which occurred in both Nebraska and Iowa. Illinois comes in next with 126 confirmed tornadoes, and Missouri rounded out the top 5 highest numbers of tornadoes by state, with 105 twisters.
There were a few state surprises this year. Florida, just outside of the top 5 states, was one. Florida's number is unusually high due to tornado reports during Hurricane Milton, which spawned more than twice the daily record of twisters.
Milton was the first hurricane since the 1960s to spawn more than three EF3 tornadoes, causing significant damage even before the hurricane’s landfall.
Ohio, with 82 preliminary tornado reports, experienced multiple tornado outbreaks on Feb. 27, March 14, April 2, and May 7. Although not ranking in the top 10 reports by state, New York also had an unusually active tornado year, with 32 tornado reports versus only 10 in 2023. Both states' numbers are likely yearly records, but final numbers won't be in until next year. Ahead of SPC's final numbers for each state, NWS offices in Oklahoma and Illinois have already declared that a record year was set for tornadoes in those states.
The only states that didn't report any tornadoes this year were Nevada, Vermont, and Maine.
Hurricanes contributed significantly in 2024
After a slow start to the year, tornado outbreaks during May pushed 2024 above normal. But a major part of the story of the 2024 tornado season has been plentiful tornadoes spawned from hurricanes. Hurricane Beryl, Hurricane Debby, Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton caused a combined 178 twisters.
Although that sounds like a lot, two years since 1995 have delivered more hurricane-spawned twisters: 2004 with 317 and 2005 with 237 tornadoes. Four hurricanes hit Florida in 2004, while 2005 was the season with the most named storms on record, including the infamous Katrina, Rita, and Wilma.
What about tornado warnings?
Unsurprisingly, the number of tornado warnings issued by the National Weather Service, 3,936, is also the highest since 2011. Florida, Oklahoma, Ohio, and New York have had more tornado warnings issued this year than any year on record (since 2002), the Iowa Environmental Mesonet says, though the number of warnings varies from state to state.
Oregon, Nevada, and Utah were the only states in the contiguous U.S. to have zero tornado warnings in 2024.
Compared to 2023
The 2023 tornado season map looked different than 2024, with Illinois taking the number-one spot with 118 tornadoes and Colorado having 88 at number two. During that year, Illinois, Colorado, Texas, Iowa and Alabama were the 2023 tornado season favorites. Utah, West Virginia, and Maine were devoid of tornadoes in 2023.
