EF0 tornado, Ft Morgan Arpt, Colorado, May 28, 2018

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

May 28, 2018

Touchdown

6:32 PM MDT (00:32 UTC)

Lifted

6:37 PM MDT (00:37 UTC)

On the ground

5 minutes

Path length

0.0 miles (0.0 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Morgan County

Touchdown point

40.320, -103.730

Lift-off point

40.320, -103.730

Record number

1805281832-01

Severe thunderstorms formed the afternoon of Memorial Day. Fourteen tornadoes were observed by spotters and chasers in the afternoon. A rare sighting of a tornado was reported from Jackson County. Some of the strongest storms formed across northeast Colorado, along a surface convergence boundary. The boundary extended from Kit Carson County north into Washington County, and then through Morgan and Weld counties. Intense convection that developed right on top of the boundary generated several tornadoes, with a few occurring simultaneously, especially across extreme southeast Washington County. Most of the tornadoes touched down in open fields and produced just minor crop damage. The heaviest damage occurred in Cope, in southeast Washington County, from an EF-1 tornado. It caused extensive damage to a carport and garage on the southeast side of town, and downed some trees. The storms also produced hail up to the size of tennis balls in Washington County. Further west, across the foothills west of Denver and across metro Denver, instability was weaker and marginally severe hail occurred, including accumulating hail across the south metro Denver.

A tornado touched down briefly in an open field. No damage was observed.

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 20:01 UTC and running to 01:47 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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:37 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), 91 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:32 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 2018 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

28 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.