EF0 tornado, Elizabeth, Colorado, August 24, 2008

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.

Rating

EF0

Date

August 24, 2008

Touchdown

5:30 PM MDT (23:30 UTC)

Lifted

5:35 PM MDT (23:35 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

0.4 miles (0.7 km)

Path width

75 yards (69 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$5,000

County

Elbert County

Touchdown point

39.548, -104.598

Lift-off point

39.551, -104.591

Record number

0808241730-02

Several landspout tornadoes developed along a boundary to the southeast of the Denver metropolitan area. In northwest Elbert County, minor damage was reported. The damage consisted of downed power lines, broken windows and a damaged out building. Severe thunderstorms also produced very heavy rain and hail, up to the size of quarters. ||In Douglas County, heavy rain caused flash flooding near the town of Westcreek. Private drives to residences in the Trail Creek subdivision were washed out. A mudslide closed State Highway 67, near Rainbow Falls Road. The road in the YMCA Camp Shady Brook was also washed out and bridges were damaged. In the camp, the gullies carved by the floodwaters were 6 feet wide by 5 feet deep.

A landspout tornado touched down briefly. Minor damage was reported which consisted of downed power lines, broken windows and a damaged out building.

A tornado touched down but did no damage.

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

7 minutes of warning. NWS BOU issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:23 UTC, 7 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:00 UTC.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

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.

The Denver radar (KFTG), 27 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:30 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.

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

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

The live radar over the trackEvery 2008 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

6 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.