EF0 tornado, Xenia to Elba, Colorado, April 8, 2013

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

April 8, 2013

Touchdown

7:42 PM MDT (01:42 UTC)

Lifted

7:52 PM MDT (01:52 UTC)

On the ground

10 minutes

Path length

0.2 miles (0.3 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Washington County

Touchdown point

39.960, -103.320

Lift-off point

39.960, -103.320

Record number

1304081942-01

High winds associated with a fast moving cold front spread across the Urban Corridor and northeast plains of Colorado. Several wind gusts to around 60 mph were observed as the cold front made its way across the region. The cold front also spawned severe thunderstorms that preceded a potent spring snowstorm. The severe weather included three tornadoes, damaging straightline winds and large hail, ranging in size from nickel to walnut size. The storms were most intense in and around Washington County where three weak tornadoes developed. A severe thunderstorm produced damaging straightline winds which flipped a mobile home, blew the roof off a barn and downed numerous power lines. A woman inside the home was not injured. Half the town of Akron was left without power after six power poles were knocked down between Brush and Last Chance. In Denver, the cold front produced a peak wind gust to 52 mph when it moved through Denver International Airport. The strong winds toppled trees and caused several flight delays and cancellations. In Longmont, the wind knocked over a tree which landed on to a house.

A tornado touched down briefly but did no damage.

A tornado touched down briefly but did no damage.

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

18 minutes of warning. NWS BOU issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:24 UTC, 18 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 02:00 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 20:34 UTC and running to 03:00 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 00:45 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.

Akron/Washington Co (AKO), 25 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Denver radar (KFTG), 106 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:40 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 2013 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

4 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.