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Deadly Arkansas Twister Was EF4,Matches '08 Storm Rating

Forecasters say a tornado that hit Little Rock's suburbs and killed 15 people had winds approaching 200 mph.

Sunday's storm was rated as a "high-end" EF4 on a scale of tornado strength. The EF4 rating is the same as that given to a storm that killed 13 people on Feb. 5, 2008.

Storms rated EF4 have winds between 166 and 200 mph.

Arkansas hasn't had a top-of-the-scale storm since April 10, 1929, when a twister formed south of Batesville in Independence County and struck Sneed in northern Jackson County. That storm was rated F5 on a previous scale and killed 23.

Sunday's death toll of 15 was the state's highest since 1997, when 25 people were killed in storms that tracked from Arkadelphia to the Missouri Bootheel.

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