It’s been 18 years since an EF3 tornado carved a 39-mile path through Colorado

I’ve personally only been involved in one severe weather event, and today marks 18 years since that traumatic event rocked my world and so many others in Northern Colorado.

May 22, 2008 was the date of one of the most destructive tornadoes in Colorado history as the storm tore through Windsor, killing one person and reshaping the town in minutes.

The tornado touched down just before noon, northeast of Platteville, and churned north-northwest for nearly 40 minutes — an unusually long and unusually directed track for a Colorado twister. Up to a mile wide at times and packing winds that peaked at 165 mph, the EF3 storm carved a continuous 39-mile damage path across Weld and Larimer counties before lifting west-northwest of Wellington.

Windsor bore the worst of it. Nearly 300 homes were significantly damaged or destroyed, 850 more sustained some damage, and preliminary FEMA estimates put the toll at roughly $147 million. Tractor-trailers were flipped along U.S. Highway 85, more than 200 power poles were snapped or blown down and some 60,000 residents lost electricity. The tornado also overturned 15 railroad cars, flattened Windsor’s main feedlot and destroyed a dairy barn, killing most of the roughly 400 cows inside. One man was killed when he tried to flee the Missile Silo Park Campground in a motor home. Seventy-eight others were injured.

The tornado remains notable for more than its strength. It struck in the late morning — rare for Colorado — and tracked northwest, the opposite direction of most tornadoes in the Great Plains. The vast majority of Colorado’s twisters register EF0 or EF1 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, making the Windsor storm a stark reminder that the state is not immune to violent severe weather. It is also Colorado’s most recent fatal tornado.

Windsor has since rebuilt and grown significantly, but the town still maintains a tornado history page on its official website, and May 22 continues to be observed as a day of remembrance. As Colorado heads into the heart of severe weather season, the National Weather Service in Boulder uses the anniversary as a reminder for residents to review their storm safety plans.