Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 1978
F2 tornado, Alachua County, Florida, May 4, 1978
This F2 tornado ran 12.8 miles across Alachua County on May 4, 1978, touching down at 6:30 AM EDT and reaching 300 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 4, and did $500,000 to $5 million 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.
F040 to 72 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- May 4, 1978
- Touchdown
- 6:30 AM EDT (10:30 UTC)
- Path length
- 12.8 miles (20.6 km)
- Path width
- 300 yards (274 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 4
- Property damage
- $500,000 to $5 million
- County
- Alachua County
- Touchdown point
- 29.570, -82.450
- Lift-off point
- 29.680, -82.280
- Record number
- 174
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.
Jacksonville, FL (KAYS), 00:00Z
10.5 hours before the tornado, 116 km from the path. May 4, 1978.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 264 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -112 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 299 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 671 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 64 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 18 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 183 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 255 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.4
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.0 K/km
Jacksonville, FL (KAYS), 12:00Z
1.5 hours after it, 116 km from the path. May 4, 1978.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 7 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -495 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 39 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1139 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 74 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 38 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 543 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 538 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.3 K/km
The surface observations
Gainesville Regional (GNV), 11 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 09:00 UTC | 73 | 71 | 140° 13 kt | 1003.4 | -TSRA | |
| 10:00 UTC | 73 | 71 | 140° 11 kt | 1003.7 | ||
| 11:00 UTC | 68 | 68 | 240° 10 kt | 1004.4 | ||
| 11:43 UTC | 320° 4 kt | 1004.7 | ||||
| 12:00 UTC | 67 | 67 | 170° 8 kt | 1004.1 | ||
| 12:17 UTC | 270° 5 kt | 1004.7 |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 1978 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 4, 1978
14 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 4 | 3:10 AM EDT | F0 | Bradford, FL | 0.1 | 13 | |||
| May 4 | 5:30 AM EDT | F0 | Dixie, FL | 0.1 | 13 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| May 4 | 9:00 AM EDT | F0 | Saint Johns, FL | 0.1 | 13 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| May 4 | 11:00 AM EDT | F0 | Saint Johns, FL | 0.2 | 10 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| May 4 | 11:45 AM EDT | F0 | Pasco, FL | 0.1 | 13 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| May 4 | 11:47 AM EDT | F3 | Pinellas, FL | 1.5 | 200 | 3 | 94 | $500,000 to $5 million |
| May 4 | 1:55 PM EDT | F0 | Putnam, FL | 0.1 | 13 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| May 4 | 3:20 PM EDT | F1 | Highlands, FL | 0.5 | 50 | 2 | $500,000 to $5 million | |
| May 4 | 3:50 PM EDT | F0 | Osceola, FL | 0.1 | 13 | 1 | $5,000 to $50,000 | |
| May 4 | 4:00 PM EDT | F0 | Highlands, FL | 0.1 | 20 | $5,000 to $50,000 | ||
| May 4 | 4:30 PM MDT | F1 | Fall River, SD | 0.2 | 200 | $500 to $5,000 | ||
| May 4 | 6:50 PM EDT | F2 | Clarendon, SC | 41.2 | 150 | 1 | $50,000 to $500,000 | |
| May 4 | 5:50 PM CDT | F0 | Sherman, TX | 11.3 | 60 | $50,000 to $500,000 | ||
| May 4 | 7:00 PM EDT | F1 | Kershaw, SC | 0.6 | 100 | $500 to $5,000 |
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.