Homes damaged near Harper as storms move through Wichita area

A tornado damaged multiple homes west of Harper in Harper County on Saturday night.

“There is some pretty bad damage to a farmhouse, and a couple of other homes were damaged, too,” said Scott Smith, a meteorologist with the Wichita branch of the National Weather Service. “One home has a roof ripped off.”

Numerous trees also were uprooted by the rope tornado, he said.

“It looks like the tornado was on the ground for a good while,” Smith said. “We’re probably going to have teams going out tomorrow to look at the damage.”

No injuries were reported.

Oil wells and storage tanks were damaged by a tornado on the Harper-Kingman county line, and tree lines also were struck, spotters reported. The Storm Prediction Center had logged 17 reports of tornadoes in Kansas on Saturday night – almost all of them southwest or west of Wichita.

Most tornadoes reported were weak and short-lived, Smith said, but obviously the one west of Harper was stronger than a land spout. Storm chasers were posting photos of tornadoes in Kingman County on Twitter and Facebook.

Hail larger than baseballs was reported early Saturday evening in Kingman.

This story was originally published May 19, 2012 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Homes damaged near Harper as storms move through Wichita area."