The Weather Service Says Heber-Overgaard's Tornado Touched Down at 6:59. Its Warning Went Out at 7:02.

A week later, the National Weather Service has the numbers it did not have that night. The tornado that crossed Heber-Overgaard on the evening of Wednesday, Oct. 21 was an EF1, with peak winds of 110 mph. It was on the ground for 9.26 miles and 11 minutes, about 350 yards wide. According to the Weather Service survey, it touched down at 6:59 p.m.

The tornado warning went out at 7:02, Phoenix NWS meteorologist Mark O'Malley told Arizona's Family. One Overgaard mother's phone lit up with the alert at 7:04. The warning came three minutes after the tornado was already on the ground.

One man riding his bike was injured, not seriously. Members of Overgaard Baptist Church had just finished a prayer service; Pastor Eric Woods and about 15 others rode it out in the women's bathroom, the one room without windows, FOX 10 reported. Elsewhere a home was lifted about four feet off its footing and a 14-foot boat ended up against a tree.

O'Malley's explanation is the physics of a short-fuse event. When a tornado spins up directly under the storm and the first sign is on radar, he told Arizona's Family, "there can be as little as a few minutes warning." On average, NWS meteorologists say, warnings arrive 8 to 15 minutes ahead.

Megan Taylor, warning coordination meteorologist at NWS Flagstaff, told FOX 10 the survey team confirmed the tornado from snapped ponderosa pines lying in many different directions, the signature that separates a tornado from straight-line wind. She called events like this a chance to gather information and improve the warning process.

Two other facts belong next to the three minutes:

It was not a quiet week for the office. The Flagstaff and Tucson offices issued 16 tornado warnings between Wednesday morning and Thursday night, KTAR reported. The Weather Service has now confirmed three EF1 tornadoes that day: Heber-Overgaard, one near Spruce Mountain south of Prescott, and, as of Oct. 29, one on Wing Mountain northwest of Flagstaff. The early radar talk of EF3-range winds did not survive the survey.

None of this is a verdict on the forecasters who were working that night. It is the question the Flagstaff office itself says it wants to learn from: what it takes to issue a tornado warning sooner in a state where the playbook almost never gets used.

State Rep. Walt Blackman, a Republican who represents the area, asked Gov. Katie Hobbs for a state emergency declaration the night of the storm. The Navajo County Board of Supervisors declared a local emergency the next morning.

On Monday, Oct. 26, Hobbs declined. Her press secretary said the governor is deeply grateful to the first responders, that state agencies are on the ground with local officials, and that DEMA raised the State Emergency Operations Center to level 1, embedded with emergency managers in Navajo and Greenlee counties, and worked with DPS and the Department of Forestry and Fire Management on wellness checks and damage surveys. The governor's office also told FOX 10 that by law, a state declaration pays to repair infrastructure, not private property.

Navajo County agrees with that read of its own situation. Board Chairman Daryl Seymour put the county's damage at $20,000 so far and told Arizona's Family the county will not appeal: "Our roads are fine. Our infrastructure is fine."

That is where homeowners fall through. ASU emergency management professor Roni Fraser told Arizona's Family that a state declaration would only have opened public assistance for things like roads, never checks for homeowners. Direct help for families requires a federal FEMA declaration, and Seymour said the county does not plan to seek one.

Blackman says many of the damaged homes were not insured and that he will ask Hobbs for an in-person meeting. One resident told Arizona's Family the cleanup will take about six months.

In the meantime, Woods told FOX 10, people have driven in from hours away to clear trees and debris.

The tornado took 11 minutes. The warning arrived for the last eight of them. For the families whose homes were hit, the recovery plan so far is neighbors with chainsaws.

This story is built from the NWS Flagstaff damage survey released Oct. 24 and the Weather Service's Oct. 29 confirmation of a third tornado, public statements by Gov. Katie Hobbs's office, Navajo County, Rep. Walt Blackman and the Heber-Overgaard Fire District, a Washington Post radar analysis, and reporting by Arizona's Family, FOX 10, KTAR, 12News and KJZZ. Times are as reported by the Weather Service and may differ by a minute in official logs, and the county's $20,000 figure covers public damage, not homes. We have not yet heard directly from NWS Flagstaff, Navajo County Emergency Management or the governor's office, so their positions here come from public statements and other outlets' reporting. We are looking for a count of damaged homes and how many were uninsured, the Flagstaff office's own review of the warning, and residents who want to tell us how they are rebuilding. Tips and corrections: [email protected].