High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The 2011 Joplin tornado was a catastrophic EF5 multiple-vortex tornado that struck Joplin, Missouri in the late afternoon of Sunday, May 22, 2011. It was part of a larger late-May tornado outbreak sequence and reached a maximum width of nearly 1 mile (1.6 km) during its path through the southern part of the city. It rapidly intensified and tracked eastward across the city, and then continued eastward across Interstate 44 into rural portions of Jasper County and Newton County. This was the third tornado to strike Joplin since May 1971.