By MIKE CORN

mcorn@dailynews.net

GOODLAND -- The National Weather Service deployed assessment teams this morning in an effort to determine the extent of the damage caused by one -- perhaps two -- tornadoes that dipped down Monday evening.

The storm caused extensive damage but there were no apparent injuries.

The storm system started at about 5 p.m. just across the border in Nebraska and then barreled south, pushing through Cheyenne, Sherman and Wallace counties, eventually dying out just north of Leoti in Wichita County. As the storm headed south, it stayed nearly parallel with Kansas Highway 27

Along the way, the storm dumped golf ball-sized hail too numerous to report, but also tennis- to softball-size hail, according to Scott Mentzer, meteorologist in charge of the Goodland weather bureau. The largest hail report was of a stone 4.25 inches in diameter in Nebraska; in Goodland, 3-inch hail was reported.

The hail was pushed along by winds that gusted at speeds of up to 80 mph. With the strong winds, tree branches were blown down, as were power poles and lines.

Efforts to contact the Sherman County Sheriff's office or the Emergency Management director Gary Rogers, who covers Cheyenne, Rawlins and Sherman counties, were unsuccessful.

Damage in the city of Goodland was extensive, Mentzer said, with windows in cars and buildings damaged by the wind-driven hail.

Extensive damage also was reported in Cheyenne County and in between where the tornadoes were reported.

Government and employee vehicles at the NWS office at Renner Field at the northeast edge of Goodland were battered by the hail, he said.

Homes in the country apparently received extensive damage, but with assessment teams still out in the fields, it's uncertain if the damage was caused by the tornadoes or if it was only hail and wind. Fields of corn were stripped by the hail.

Mentzer said the larger hailstones were not isolated, but numerous in the area.

The tornado is thought to have formed about 10 miles north of Goodland.

"Depending on who you believe, it may have lifted 2 to 3 miles north of Goodland," he said.

There was a report of damage southeast of Goodland, but Mentzer said it's unknown if that was caused by a tornado or simply the result of hail and wind.

An assessment team was checking that site this morning.

"At least one and possibly two," Mentzer said of how many tornadoes might have actually formed. "It may have had the same parent cell."

Although no injuries were reported, he said there's plenty of property damage, most of it the result of hail and wind.

"We had it right here in downtown Goodland," he said.

Winds topped out at about 80 mph in Goodland, Mentzer said, accompanied by the tennis- to baseball-size hail.

And there weren't just a few.

"It was a lot of them," he said. "We were being pelted."

Mentzer said it's still uncertain how big the storm was.

"It was a long-track supercell thunderstorm," he said, with hail reports across the 15-mile width of the storm.

The largest hail likely was along a swath about 2 miles wide.