EF0 tornado, Elizabeth, Colorado, June 6, 2012

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

June 6, 2012

Touchdown

7:44 PM MDT (01:44 UTC)

Path length

0.1 miles (0.2 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Elbert County

Touchdown point

39.470, -104.620

Lift-off point

39.470, -104.620

Record number

1206061944-01

Severe thunderstorms broke late in the evening, striking areas hardest from Denver southward. Locations impacted by the storms included but were not limited to: Aurora, Castle Rock, Centennial, Highlands Ranch, Lone Tree, Parker, Surrey Ridge. The storms produced a barrage of large hail, damaging straight line winds, flash flooding and several short lived tornadoes. The hail ranged in size from 1 to 2 inches in diameter, and caused extensive damage to homes and automobiles. The hail inundated the roadways with several inches of hail in Douglas County. Consequently, snow plows had to be called out to clear the roadways. One tornado that touched down near Grover in Weld County ripped a tree from the ground and tossed it approximately twenty feet. ||The combination of torrential hail and heavy rain produced flash flooding in parts of Elbert, Douglas and Arapahoe Counties, as thunderstorms brought up to 3.35 inches of rain to some areas within 90 minutes. In Aurora, Picadilly Road was closed from flooding north of 6th Avenue. A water rescue took place on South Gun Club Road in Arapahoe County, where floodwaters were rushing to depth of 3 feet. Flash flooding forced the closure of several streets and roads from Parker south to The Pinery, where the floodwaters inundated the roadway with up to 2 feet in several locations.||At Centennial Airport in Arapahoe County, a historic B-17 Flying Fortress suffered extensive damage as hailstones as large as ping pong balls hit the aircraft. Although the airframe itself did not require repair, the fabric-covered ailerons and elevators were extensively damaged. The hail came straight down and punched holes in the fabric-covered control surfaces. The plane landed just hours before the storm hit to participate in the weekend tour stop. Lightning struck two homes, one in Lakewood and the other in Parker. Straight line winds downed trees and power lines in Aurora. As a result, scattered electrical outages affect approximately five thousand residents.

A small tornado touched down but did no damage.

A small tornado touched down but did no damage.

A small tornado touched down but did no damage.

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

37 minutes of warning. NWS BOU issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:07 UTC, 37 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 21:01 UTC and running to 05:00 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 00:46 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.

Denver/Centennial (APA), 23 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The Denver radar (KFTG), 36 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:42 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 2012 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.