Sleepy Town Hit by 1.7 Mile Wide Tornado (Greensburg, Kansas EF-5 Tornado)

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]At approximately 9:03 p.m., a tornado touched down south of Greensburg, Kansas, in Kiowa County.

[00:00:07]It began widening almost immediately.

[00:00:11]As it tracked northward, the circulation grew. It grew into what meteorologists call a wedge tornado, a tornado so wide at its base that it appears to have no visible funnel, just a solid wall of darkness stretching from cloud to ground.

[00:00:28]By the time it crossed US Route 183 and began its northwest turn toward Greensburg, it reached its peak width, 1.7 mi across.

[00:00:39]To put that number in context, the town of Greensburg was roughly 1.5 mi wide.

[00:00:45]The tornado was larger than the town it was heading for.