Tornado, Brevard
- When
- March 30, 8:46 PM EST to 8:56 PM EST
- Where
- Brevard County, Merritt Is to Cape Canaveral
- Rating
- F1
- Path length
- 7 mi
- Path width
- 40 yd
- Injuries
- 18 direct, 0 indirect
- Property damage
- $500,000
- Coordinates
- 28.350, -80.720
Tornado in Florida, March 30, 1996
An F1 waterspout-tornado came off of New Found Harbor Bay and touched down briefly just south of State Road 520 on New Found Harbor Road in Merritt Island. The tornado blew out windows and damaged roofs on six homes.
Where it happened
Every event with a place to put it. Tap one for its entry below.
- Tornadoes
- Tropical storms and surge
- Floods
- Wind
- Hail
- Winter weather
- Heat and drought
- Cold
- Fire, smoke and dust
- Marine and coastal
- Other
The toll
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 18
- Property damage
- $500,000
- Crop damage
- None recorded
- Events
- 1
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
What happened
The episode as NWS MLB wrote it up.
An F1 waterspout-tornado came off of New Found Harbor Bay and touched down briefly just south of State Road 520 on New Found Harbor Road in Merritt Island. The tornado blew out windows and damaged roofs on six homes. The tornado moved east northeast into the Banana River Lagoon and came ashore south of Cape Canaveral where it destroyed a small building on a used car lot. An eighteen food boot was blown off its trailer. The tornado damaged the roof of a night club and a dive shop. Twenty five other buildings in the area received minor damage. Widows were blown out of 30 vehicles. Damage estimates were near $500,000.
The radar
The Melbourne radar (KMLB), 27 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the first event began at 01:46 UTC.
Event by event
1 tornado. Local standard time, as filed.
What these are
- Tornado
- A violently rotating column of air in contact with the ground and extending from a thunderstorm, filed with its path, width and Fujita or Enhanced Fujita rating from the damage survey.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
The same day elsewhere
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Damaging Wind in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Damaging Wind in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Arkansas, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
- Hail in Florida, March 30, 1996
More
Every storm in Florida in 1996Every state in 1996This day in weather historyThe tornado archive for Florida, 1996Warnings in Florida, March 1996
Sources
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 5547916.