Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Udall, KS

Udall is a small city in Cowley County in south-central Kansas, about 30 miles southeast of Wichita.

Udall was laid out in 1881 by J. M. Napier and P. W. Smith and named after Cornelius Udall, an English author; its first post office had opened in September 1879.

D. C. Green built the first house in Udall and opened the town's first store.

On the night of May 25, 1955, an F5 tornado about 0.74 miles wide struck Udall at 10:35 p.m. with no warning issued — it remains the deadliest tornado ever to hit Kansas.

The tornado killed 77 people and injured 270, destroyed 192 buildings including 170 homes, and left no building within the city limits untouched; around half of all families in Udall lost one or more members.

The Udall tornado came from the same supercell that had devastated Blackwell, Oklahoma, earlier that evening, killing 20 people there.

Udall rebuilt after the disaster, and by the 1960 census its population of 600 had already surpassed its pre-tornado level.

The 2020 census counted 661 people in Udall; a decade earlier, the 2010 census counted 746 people in 289 households.

The community is served by Udall USD 463 schools, and the Udall Eagles won the Kansas Class 1A state high school volleyball championship in 1973.

The 1955 disaster is chronicled in Jim Minick's 2023 book Without Warning: The Tornado of Udall, Kansas, the first full-length account of the tornado.