Iowa Sets New Record for Widest Tornado After Catastrophic Storm Hits Essex

Last week, the town of Essex, IA was rocked by what has now been billed as the widest tornado in the history of Iowa. The tornado itself was so unfathomably large that quantifying it still doesn't quite do the catastrophic storm justice.

The twisted ripped through nearly 20 miles of southwestern Iowa as an EF1 tornado, per Yahoo! Winds effectively reached up to 110mph, and the sheer width of the tornado was large enough to be classified as the largest in the state.

Just How Large Was the Essex Tornado?:

The twister measured 1.78 miles in width, or 3,130 yards. To put that in perspective, that's more than 31 football fields.

Yahoo! noted that the previous record holder was a tornado in Pocahontas County, IA back in April 2011. At its peak, that twister was 2,640 yards (1.5 miles) wide, and reached an intensity of an EF3. The largest tornado measured in the entire country was the 2013 El Reno tornado, which reached lengths of about 2.6 miles in width.

Assessing Any Injuries and Damage:

Thankfully, the damage the Essex tornado inevitably produced was mostly to power poles, outbuildings, and trees, per Yahoo! Sadly, KETV caught up with an elderly woman whose home was one of the few significantly damaged by the twister. Her recount of the storm was harrowing, and the pain in her voice and on her face nothing short of heartbreaking.

The Essex tornado was known as a wedge tornado. Tornado width often depends on how much moisture is in the air, and how low the clouds condense to form the devastating force. An environment that is increasingly moist will likely producer wider tornadoes, while environments without much/any moisture tend to produce more narrow tornadoes.

A Community Comes Together to Help:

A reporter for KETV said that upon arriving on-scene, she witnessed numerous members of the community helping the aforementioned woman whose home was severely damaged in the storm. It's like Fred Rogers once said: in times of calamity and tragedy, always look for the helpers. They're out there. They always are.

Read more about the recent Essex, IA tornado on Yahoo!'s website.