Tornadoes · United States · Colorado · 2026

Unrated tornado, Custer County, Colorado, August 27, 2026

This Unrated tornado ran 0.1 miles across Custer County on August 27, 2026, touching down at 3:55 PM MDT and reaching 5 yards wide. It killed nobody.

Preliminary. This is NWS PUB's damage survey, filed in the Damage Assessment Toolkit. The rating, the path and the casualties are the survey's and can change while it is revised. The Storm Prediction Center compiles the official record of 2026 from these surveys and publishes it in the spring of 2027; this page moves to that tornado's permanent address when it does.

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 mph

    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. Unratedthis tornado

    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 survey

Rating, as surveyed
Unrated, preliminary
Date
August 27, 2026
Touchdown
3:55 PM MDT (21:55 UTC)
Lifted
3:56 PM MDT (21:56 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
5 yards (5 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Custer County
Touchdown point
38.129, -105.298
Lift-off point
38.127, -105.297
Surveyed by
NWS PUB
Survey last edited
September 7, 2026
Record number
None yet. SPC numbers 2026 in the spring of 2027.

What the survey found

Via video evidence from social media and a report from emergency management, a brief tornado has been confirmed along the far western slopes of the Wet Mountains.

Written by NWS PUB in the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit. A survey is revised as better evidence arrives.

The warnings

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.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
19:00 UTC01:10 UTCFlash Flood WatchPUB
21:23 UTC00:30 UTCFlash Flood WarningPUB
21:58 UTC22:12 UTCTornado WarningPUB

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 Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:51 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.

Grand Junction, CO (KGJT), 00:00Z

2.1 hours after it, 300 km from the path. August 28, 2026.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Grand Junction, CO at 00:00Z on 2026-08-28Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 441 joules per kilogram, CIN -3, lifted condensation level 3666 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 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, Grand Junction, CO at 00:00Z on 2026-08-28The 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 -25 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 7 knots.193958Sfc1 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
441 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-3 J/kg
Surface CAPE
415 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3666 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
7 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-25 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-6 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
10.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Westcliffe (C08), 14 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
19:55 UTC80.635.640° 8 kt1031.2
20:15 UTC78.833.850° 4 kt1031.2
20:35 UTC7733.8 3 kt1030.8
20:55 UTC7733.820° 6 kt1030.8
21:15 UTC75.237.4360° 13 kt1030.8TS
21:35 UTC64.444.6290° 21 kt301031.2TS
21:55 UTC64.448.2260° 9 kt1031.5-TSRA
22:15 UTC66.251.890° 5 kt111031.5VCTS
22:35 UTC69.851.870° 18 kt1031.2VCTS
22:55 UTC685070° 15 kt261031.8
23:15 UTC69.846.480° 8 kt141031.5
23:35 UTC6846.40° 0 kt1031.8

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

The radar

The Pueblo radar (KPUX), 104 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:52 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
21:55 UTCTORNADO3 Ne RositaCuster, CORelayed via Fremont County dispatch, location estimated.
22:19 UTCFLASH FLOOD3 Ne San IsabelPueblo, CO10 inches of water coming down and across the dirt portion of 12 mile road.
23:24 UTCRAIN 1.081 Wsw RyePueblo, COStorm total.

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2026 tornado in ColoradoEvery tornado in Colorado since 1950Warnings in force in Colorado nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 27, 2026

2 more have been surveyed in the United States that day, so far.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 272:10 PM EDTEF0Saratoga, NY0.250
August 276:05 PM EDTEF1Saratoga, NY1.2250

What this means

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. A survey can be revised, so the rating, the path and the casualties can all still change.

Sources

NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit, the record the survey teams file from the damage, and NOAA Storm Prediction Center storm reports. Neither is the official database for 2026, which SPC publishes in the spring of 2027.