Tornadoes · United States · Colorado · 2010

EF0 tornado, Bethune, Colorado, April 13, 2010

This EF0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Kit Carson County on April 13, 2010, touching down at 6:59 PM MDT 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
April 13, 2010
Touchdown
6:59 PM MDT (00:59 UTC)
Lifted
7:00 PM MDT (01:00 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.5 miles (0.8 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Kit Carson County
Touchdown point
39.171, -102.534
Lift-off point
39.171, -102.534
Record number
1004131859-01

What the Weather Service recorded

After a day of strong southwest gradient winds gusting over 60 mph, a NE to SW oriented line of strong to severe thunderstorms developed in eastern Colorado and later moved into western Kansas. Several reports of severe hail and one brief tornado occurred with the stronger storms.

Tornado report was relayed to NWS via Kit Carson County dispatch.

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

The warnings

1 minute of warning. NWS GLD issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:58 UTC, 1 minute before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
09:15 UTC02:35 UTCHigh Wind WarningGLD
15:00 UTC09:15 UTCWind AdvisoryGLD
00:45 UTC01:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningGLD
00:58 UTC01:30 UTCTornado WarningGLD

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 forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:44 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 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.

Denver, CO (KDNR), 00:00Z

1.0 hours before the tornado, 98 km from the path. April 14, 2010.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Denver, CO at 00:00Z on 2010-04-14Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -86716, lifted condensation level 3626 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 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, Denver, CO at 00:00Z on 2010-04-14The 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 121 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 84 knots.1939587897117Sfc1 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-86716 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3626 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
84 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
121 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
221 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
9.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Denver, CO (KDNR), 12:00Z

11.0 hours after it, 98 km from the path. April 14, 2010.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Denver, CO at 12:00Z on 2010-04-14Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -87877, lifted condensation level 2773 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 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, Denver, CO at 12:00Z on 2010-04-14The 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 70 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 47 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-87877 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
2773 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
47 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
70 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
264 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Goodland radar (KGLD), 75 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:59 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
22:07 UTCNON-TSTM WND GST 60FirstviewCheyenne, CO
22:12 UTCNON-TSTM WND GST 599 Nne Kit CarsonCheyenne, CO
23:59 UTCTORNADO11 Ssw BethuneKit Carson, CORELAYED THROUGH KIT CARSON COUNTY DISPATCH
00:59 UTCTORNADO11 Ssw BethuneKit Carson, CORELAYED THROUGH KIT CARSON COUNTY DISPATCH
01:05 UTCHAIL 15 Wnw FirstviewCheyenne, CO

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2010 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado 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.