Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2000

F0 tornado, Bokeelia, Florida, August 15, 2000

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Lee County on August 15, 2000, touching down at 11:30 AM EDT. It killed nobody.

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 mphthis tornado

    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 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. 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
F0
Date
August 15, 2000
Touchdown
11:30 AM EDT (15:30 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
0 yards (0 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Lee County
Touchdown point
26.700, -82.150
Lift-off point
26.700, -82.150
Record number
496

What the Weather Service recorded

A mariner reported that a waterspout over Charlotte Harbor moved onshore as an F0 tornado and quickly dissipated near Bokeelia on northern Pine Island.

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

The warnings

7 minutes of warning. NWS TBW issued a tornado warning for this county at 15:23 UTC, 7 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 15:45 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
15:23 UTC15:45 UTCTornado WarningTBW

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 12:45 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 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.

Tampa Bay, FL (KTBW), 12:00Z

3.5 hours before the tornado, 114 km from the path. August 15, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Tampa Bay, FL at 12:00Z on 2000-08-15Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2858 joules per kilogram, CIN -2, lifted condensation level 681 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, Tampa Bay, FL at 12:00Z on 2000-08-15The 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 28 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 12 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
2858 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-2 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3298 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
681 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
28 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
17 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
1.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Tampa Bay, FL (KTBW), 00:00Z

8.5 hours after it, 114 km from the path. August 16, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Tampa Bay, FL at 00:00Z on 2000-08-16Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1807 joules per kilogram, CIN -10, lifted condensation level 1234 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, Tampa Bay, FL at 00:00Z on 2000-08-16The 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 49 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 21 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
1807 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-10 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3354 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1234 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
49 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
33 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Punta Gorda (PGD), 29 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
13:53 UTC8476310° 3 kt1022
14:53 UTC8476330° 7 kt1022-RA
15:53 UTC8274320° 8 kt1022+RA
16:07 UTC84.273.4280° 8 kt1022
16:53 UTC83750° 0 kt1021.7VCTS
17:27 UTC100° 4 kt1021.7

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2000 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

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.