Tornadoes · United States · Colorado · 1969

F1 tornado, Baca County, Colorado, May 31, 1969

This F1 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Baca County on May 31, 1969, touching down at 5:15 PM GMT-6 and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $5,000 to $50,000 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.

  1. F040 to 72 mph

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

  2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

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

  3. 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.

  4. 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.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

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

  6. 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.

  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
F1
Date
May 31, 1969
Touchdown
5:15 PM GMT-6 (23:15 UTC)
Path length
0.3 miles (0.5 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Baca County
Touchdown point
37.370, -102.620
Record number
228

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.

Dodge City, (KDDC), 12:00Z

11.3 hours before the tornado, 244 km from the path. May 31, 1969.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1969-05-31Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 616 joules per kilogram, CIN -366, lifted condensation level 1529 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, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1969-05-31The 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 -43 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 32 knots.1939Sfc1 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
616 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-366 J/kg
Surface CAPE
840 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1529 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-43 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
2 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
4.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Dodge City, (KDDC), 00:00Z

0.7 hours after it, 244 km from the path. June 1, 1969.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1969-06-01Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 442 joules per kilogram, CIN -112, lifted condensation level 1628 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, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1969-06-01The 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 53 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 40 knots.193958Sfc1 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
442 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-112 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2871 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1628 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
40 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
9 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
53 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
415 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.1
Supercell composite
7.4
0-3 km lapse rate
7.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1969 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 31, 1969

9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 3112:52 PM GMT-6F0Wayne, UT0.110
May 3112:52 PM GMT-6F0Wayne, UT0.110
May 3112:52 PM GMT-6F0Wayne, UT0.110
May 312:00 PM GMT-5F1Grant, WI16.050$500 to $5,000
May 313:00 PM GMT-5F0Dane, WI1.050$500 to $5,000
May 314:30 PM GMT-5F1Washington, WI1.950$5,000 to $50,000
May 314:45 PM GMT-5F0Dodge, MN0.113
May 315:05 PM GMT-5F0Gage, NE0.110
May 319:30 PM GMT-5F1Sumner, KS2.0250$50,000 to $500,000

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.