Tornadoes · United States · California · 1996
F0 tornado, Sonoma, California, December 23, 1996
This F0 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Sonoma County on December 23, 1996, touching down at 11:30 AM PST and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 1, and did $1,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
F040 to 72 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
F2113 to 157 mph
Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.
F3158 to 206 mph
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
F5261 to 318 mph
Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.
Unrated
The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.
The record
- Rating
- F0
- Date
- December 23, 1996
- Touchdown
- 11:30 AM PST (19:30 UTC)
- Path length
- 0.3 miles (0.5 km)
- Path width
- 20 yards (18 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 1
- Property damage
- $1,000
- County
- Sonoma County
- Touchdown point
- 38.280, -122.080
- Lift-off point
- 38.280, -122.070
- Record number
- 1085
What the Weather Service recorded
This storm cut a 20 yard wide quartrer mile path of distruction through the north side of Napa. A jogger was slammed into a fence but reported only minor injuries. The storm was spotted by the Napa police.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The surface observations
Travis Afb/Fairfld (SUU), 13 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 00:00 UTC |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 1996 tornado in CaliforniaEvery tornado in California since 1950Warnings in force in California nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of December 23, 1996
4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| December 23 | 10:45 AM CST | F0 | Crawford, MO | 0.5 | 50 | |||
| December 23 | 11:30 AM CST | F0 | Texas, MO | 1.0 | 50 | |||
| December 23 | 10:00 AM PST | F1 | Marin, CA | 6.0 | 20 | $200,000 | ||
| December 23 | 2:55 PM CST | F1 | Randolph, IL | 2.0 | 70 |
What this means
Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.
Sources
NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.