List of tornado emergencies

Since its initial usage in May 1999, the National Weather Service (NWS) in the United States has used the tornado emergency bulletin — a high-end classification of tornado warning — sent through either the issuance of a warning or via a "severe weather statement" that provides updated information on an ongoing warning—that is issued when a violent tornado (confirmed by radar or ground observation) is expected to impact a heavily populated area, and pose a significant threat to life and property. The tornado emergency wording is issued when reliable sources confirm an ongoing tornado with a catastrophic risk to life and property.^[1]

To date, a total of 201^{[needs update]} (316 unofficially)^[2] known tornado emergencies have been issued by the NWS through its local Weather Forecast Offices; all but 16 of these have resulted in a confirmed tornado,^[3][2] with the resulting tornadoes being responsible for a total of 554 fatalities. Currently, the 2011 Super Outbreak holds the all-time record for the most tornado emergencies issued during a 24-hour period, with a cumulative total of 16 issued (between four local NWS Weather Forecast Offices (WFO) serving the southeastern United States) during the outbreak event.

Below is a listing of each individual emergency that has been issued since the terminology was introduced. The individual tornado emergencies are listed based on the specific cities or areas involved, the counties these areas are in, and the states the counties are in. Individual tornado events that had multiple emergencies issued for them are grouped together by the tornadoes' injuries, fatalities and references. Tornado emergencies issued for multiple recorded tornadoes will be displayed with all tornadoes within the emergency section, often grouped by the date of occurrence. All the tornadoes listed occurred between the time the tornado emergency was issued to the time the tornado warning expired.