Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 1968

F2 tornado, Volusia County, Florida, August 30, 1968

This F2 tornado ran 2.0 miles across Volusia County on August 30, 1968, touching down at 3:15 AM GMT-4 and reaching 127 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $5,000 to $50,000 of property damage.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mph

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 mphthis tornado

    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. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 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
F2
Date
August 30, 1968
Touchdown
3:15 AM GMT-4 (07:15 UTC)
Path length
2.0 miles (3.2 km)
Path width
127 yards (116 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Volusia County
Touchdown point
29.280, -81.030
Record number
544

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.

Cape Canaveral, FL (KXMR), 00:00Z

7.3 hours before the tornado, 104 km from the path. August 30, 1968.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 00:00Z on 1968-08-30Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 767 joules per kilogram, CIN -27, lifted condensation level 907 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, Cape Canaveral, FL at 00:00Z on 1968-08-30The 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 34 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 15 knots.1939Sfc1 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
767 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-27 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1272 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
907 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
34 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
66 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cape Canaveral, FL (KXMR), 12:00Z

4.7 hours after it, 104 km from the path. August 30, 1968.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 12:00Z on 1968-08-30Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1632 joules per kilogram, CIN -11, lifted condensation level 579 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, Cape Canaveral, FL at 12:00Z on 1968-08-30The 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 46 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 18 knots.1939Sfc1 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
1632 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-11 J/kg
Surface CAPE
612 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
579 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
18 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
46 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
56 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1968 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 30, 1968

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 301:56 PM GMT-5F0, FL2.010

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.