1 thunderstorm wind, as filed by the National Weather Service.
Every event with a place to put it. Tap one for its entry below.
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.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Tampa Bay, FL wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Mar 16, 7:20 PM EST, 5 hours 10 minutes earlier.
WEST CENTRAL AND SOUTHWEST FLORIDA FORECAST DISCUSSION NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TAMPA BAY AREA - RUSKIN FL 720 PM EST SUN MAR 16 2003 ...SHORT TERM... WILL BE MAKING A QUICK ZONE UPDATE SOON TO REVISE TIMING OF SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS OVER THE GULF WATERS. WILL ALSO BE ABLE TO REMOVE AFTERNOON POP WORDING SOON FOR THE INTERIOR. MAIN REASON FOR UPDATE IS TO TAKE OUT AFTER MIDNIGHT WORDING AS DISTANCE SPEED TOOLS SHOW THE PRECIP ARRIVING VERY CLOSE TO THE MIDNIGHT HOUR. WITH THE SHIFT NORTHWARD IN UPPER DISTURBANCE...FORWARD MOTION OF SQUALL LINE WILL SLOW...BUT PREFER NOT TO GET TOO CUTE WITH THE TIMING. OTHERWISE...WILL MAINTAIN HIGH END LIKELY POPS OVERNIGHT AS MODELS DOING A DECENT JOB DEPICTING CURRENT RAIN BANDS IN THE GULF. THE KEY TO RAIN FOR THE SOUTHWEST COAST WILL BE THE VORT LOBE EJECTING OUT OF NORTHERN CUBA AND INTO THE KEYS AS DEPICTED BY THE GFS AND MESO-ETA. WATER VAPOR VERIFIES THIS SOLUTION AND CURRENT MOSAIC RADAR INDICATES A GOOD DEAL OF CONVECTION JUST WEST OF THE KEYS. AS THE PARENT UPPER LOW SWINGS NORTHWARD...THIS PRECIP SHOULD FILL INTO THE SOUTHWEST COAST NICELY ALBEIT WEAKENED FROM THE SLIGHTLY COOLER SHELF WATERS. MAY NEED ADDITIONAL UPDATE LATER THIS EVENING TO UP TO CATEGORICAL POPS AS SYSTEM CONTINUES TO EVOLVE. AS TO SEVERE POTENTIAL...EXPECT MOSTLY SHOWERS WITH EMBEDDED THUNDERSTORMS. WITH LOW WET BULB ZEROS IN COLD ATMOSPHERE ALOFT... HAIL WILL AGAIN BE THE MAIN THREAT. EXPECT ONLY THE STRONGEST FEW STORMS DURING THE OVERNIGHT PERIOD TO BE STRONG ENOUGH TO PUSH STORM CORES TO THE NEEDED 15K TO 20K FEET. ...MARINE... AGAIN...WILL REVISE WORDING TO ACCOUNT FOR REVISED TIMING OF THE LINE. OTHERWISE...CURRENT PACKAGE LOOKS GOOD AND NO CHANGES PLANNED. .TBW...NONE. JTD
FLZ039-042-043-048>052-055>057-060>062-065-161630- HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TAMPA BAY AREA - RUSKIN FL 530 AM EST SUN MAR 16 2003 THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR WEST CENTRAL AND SOUTHWEST FLORIDA. .DAY ONE...TODAY: SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS WILL FORM THIS AFTERNOON ALONG THE SEABREEZES AND THEN MOVE NORTHEAST ACROSS THE INTERIOR COUNTIES LATER IN THE AFTERNOON. THE MAIN THREATS WILL BE GUSTY WINDS OR POSSIBLE SMALL HAIL. DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...MONDAY THROUGH SATURDAY: A WEAK SURFACE DISTURBANCE MOVING ALONG THE GULF COAST WILL MAINTAIN A MOIST AND UNSTABLE AIR MASS OVER THE AREA WITH SCATTERED THUNDERSTORM MONDAY AND ENDING BY EARLY TUESDAY. THUNDERSTORMS WILL BE ISOLATED WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAYS AFTERNOONS BEFORE BECOMING SCATTERED FRIDAY WHEN A COLD FRONT TRAVERSES THE REGION. .SPOTTER CALL TO ACTION STATEMENT... SPOTTER ACTIVATION WILL NOT BE NEEDED. FOR ADDITIONAL WEATHER INFORMATION, CHECK OUR WEB SITE AT HTTP://WWW.SRH.NOAA.GOV/TBW RKR
PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TAMPA BAY AREA - RUSKIN FL
849 PM EST SUN MAR 16 2003
TIME(EST) .....CITY LOCATION..... STATE ...EVENT/REMARKS...
....COUNTY LOCATION....
0330 PM RIVERVIEW FL .75 INCH HAIL
03/16/03 HILLSBOROUGH REPORTED BY OFF-DUTY NWS
EMPLOYEE.
JCMThe Tampa radar (KTBW), 19 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the first event began at 05:28 UTC.
1 thunderstorm wind. Local standard time, as filed.
The wind caused minor house damage and blew down 120 feet of fence near the corner of Balm Riverview and Rhodine. A tree fell on a mobile home in Riverview and multiple trees were down along State Highway 301.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Florida in 2003Every state in 2003This day in weather historyWarnings in Florida, March 2003
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: 5344194.