Tornadoes · United States · California · 2014

EF0 tornado, Paradise Skypark Arp, California, March 25, 2014

This EF0 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Butte County on March 25, 2014, touching down at 7:15 PM PDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. EF2111 to 135 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.

  4. EF3136 to 165 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. EF5over 200 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.

  7. 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
EF0
Date
March 25, 2014
Touchdown
7:15 PM PDT (02:15 UTC)
Lifted
7:17 PM PDT (02:17 UTC)
On the ground
2 minutes
Path length
0.3 miles (0.4 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Butte County
Touchdown point
39.710, -121.670
Lift-off point
39.711, -121.665
Record number
1403252015-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A trough over the eastern Pacific dropped southward over the region bringing a series of shortwaves across interior Northern California. These shortwaves brought enough instability and moisture to produce tornadic supercells to interior NorCal. One tornado was reported on March 25th and five tornadoes were reported on March 26th. The trough also brought heavy snow to the Northern Sierra Nevada and Western Plumas County, mainly Wednesday and Wednesday night (March 26) with snow levels dropping to 4000-5000 ft.

An EF0 tornado touched down near Highway 99 between Skyway Road and Neal Road at around 7:15pm PDT. Winds were estimated to be 65mph. A rotted tree along Neal Road was blown down, and branches were blown off of surrounding trees. Swirl marks were on the ground, but the tornado was no more than 10-15 yards wide.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.

The air that afternoon

The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.

Oakland, CA (KOAK), 00:00Z

2.3 hours before the tornado, 225 km from the path. March 26, 2014.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Oakland, CA at 00:00Z on 2014-03-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 6 joules per kilogram, CIN -68, lifted condensation level 703 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Oakland, CA at 00:00Z on 2014-03-26The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity -17 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 43 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
6 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-68 J/kg
Surface CAPE
202 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
703 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
43 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
6 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-17 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
104 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
-0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
7.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Oakland, CA (KOAK), 12:00Z

9.7 hours after it, 225 km from the path. March 26, 2014.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Oakland, CA at 12:00Z on 2014-03-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 46 joules per kilogram, CIN -4, lifted condensation level 857 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°
Temperature in red, dew point in green, the mixed-layer parcel dashed. The warm shading is its CAPE, the cool shading the inhibition it has to break through.
HodographHodograph, Oakland, CA at 12:00Z on 2014-03-26The wind through the lowest 10 kilometers as a curve, rings every 10 meters per second labeled in knots. Zero to 1 km storm-relative helicity 68 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 knots.19395878Sfc1 km3 km6 km9 kmRMLM
The wind turning with height, colored by layer: ground to 1 km, 1 to 3 km, 3 to 6 km, 6 to 10 km. RM and LM are the right and left moving storms Bunkers' method gives; the shaded area is the 0 to 1 km storm-relative helicity.
Mixed-layer CAPE
46 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-4 J/kg
Surface CAPE
198 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
857 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
68 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
115 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Beale AFB radar (KBBX), 24 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:15 UTC.

Open the radar archive at this moment, over the track

Reflectivity and velocity, decoded from the Level II archive in the browser. Volumes take a few seconds to open the first time.

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
02:27 UTCHAIL 0.51 S ChicoButte, CA

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2014 tornado in CaliforniaEvery tornado in California since 1950Warnings in force in California nowThe forecast where you are

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.