Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2001
F1 tornado, Milton, Florida, October 13, 2001
This F1 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Santa Rosa County on October 13, 2001, touching down at 4:40 PM CDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $620,000 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.
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 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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
- F1
- Date
- October 13, 2001
- Touchdown
- 4:40 PM CDT (21:40 UTC)
- Path length
- 0.5 miles (0.8 km)
- Path width
- 50 yards (46 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $620,000
- County
- Santa Rosa County
- Touchdown point
- 30.630, -87.030
- Lift-off point
- 30.630, -87.030
- Record number
- 467
What the Weather Service recorded
An F1 tornado occurred near Byron Street just to the northwest of Milton High School. Most of the damage produced by the tornado was to trees and to the roofs of homes, with one of the homes having it's roof completely torn off. The most significant damage which resulted from the tornado occurred at a storage facility near Stewart Street. Several units of the long storage buildings were damaged, and three rental trucks were also damaged. Shortly after passing north of the storage facility, the tornado lifted back into the cloud.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
25 minutes of warning. NWS MOB issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:15 UTC, 25 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:00 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19:00 UTC | 19:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | MOB |
| 19:10 UTC | 19:30 UTC | Tornado Warning | MOB |
| 19:32 UTC | 20:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | MOB |
| 20:08 UTC | 20:30 UTC | Tornado Warning | MOB |
| 21:15 UTC | 22:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | MOB |
| 22:23 UTC | 23:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | MOB |
| 01:55 UTC | 02:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | MOB |
| 02:31 UTC | 03:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | MOB |
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 Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 21:56 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.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2001 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of October 13, 2001
31 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| October 13 | 2:39 AM CDT | F1 | Trinity, TX | 0.5 | 30 | $10,000 | ||
| October 13 | 2:45 AM CDT | F1 | Polk, TX | 0.3 | 25 | $30,000 | ||
| October 13 | 4:55 AM CDT | F1 | Jefferson, TX | 2.0 | 15 | $1.0 million | ||
| October 13 | 5:05 AM CDT | F1 | Beauregard Parish, LA | 0.5 | 10 | $50,000 | ||
| October 13 | 7:30 AM CDT | F1 | Baldwin, AL | 0.1 | 30 | $50,000 | ||
| October 13 | 7:35 AM CDT | F0 | Baldwin, AL | 0.1 | 20 | $10,000 | ||
| October 13 | 8:39 AM CDT | F0 | Rankin, MS | 0.2 | 30 | |||
| October 13 | 8:45 AM CDT | F1 | Acadia Parish, LA | 0.5 | 10 | $120,000 | ||
| October 13 | 8:45 AM CDT | F0 | Rankin, MS | 0.2 | 30 | $10,000 | ||
| October 13 | 9:00 AM CDT | F1 | Vermilion Parish, LA | 0.5 | 10 | $70,000 | ||
| October 13 | 10:25 AM CDT | F0 | Copiah, MS | 0.2 | 30 | |||
| October 13 | 10:30 AM CDT | F0 | Lincoln, MS | 1.0 | 40 | $30,000 | ||
| October 13 | 12:55 PM CDT | F0 | Marion, MS | 0.2 | 25 | $1,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:00 PM CDT | F0 | Baldwin, AL | 0.2 | 30 | $20,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:25 PM CDT | F3 | Baldwin, AL | 1.0 | 440 | $250,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:30 PM CDT | F0 | Lamar, MS | 0.2 | 25 | $1,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:35 PM CDT | F1 | Marengo, AL | 7.1 | 450 | $40,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:40 PM CDT | F0 | Baldwin, AL | 0.2 | 30 | $10,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:44 PM CDT | F2 | Baldwin, AL | 0.7 | 200 | $200,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:58 PM CDT | F0 | Jones, MS | 0.2 | 25 | |||
| October 13 | 2:20 PM CDT | F0 | Jones, MS | 0.2 | 25 | $30,000 | ||
| October 13 | 2:38 PM CDT | F1 | Perry, AL | 1.5 | 50 | $110,000 | ||
| October 13 | 2:45 PM CDT | F0 | Baldwin, AL | 0.3 | 30 | $30,000 | ||
| October 13 | 3:05 PM CDT | F0 | Clarke, MS | 0.2 | 30 | $1,000 | ||
| October 13 | 3:40 PM CDT | F0 | Lauderdale, MS | 0.3 | 25 | $3,000 | ||
| October 13 | 3:59 PM CDT | F1 | Lowndes, MS | 0.2 | 30 | $80,000 | ||
| October 13 | 5:35 PM CDT | F0 | Escambia, FL | 2.0 | 200 | $250,000 | ||
| October 13 | 6:20 PM CDT | F0 | Plaquemines Parish, LA | 0.3 | 20 | $10,000 | ||
| October 13 | 10:15 PM CDT | F1 | Walton, FL | 1.0 | 100 | $750,000 | ||
| October 13 | 11:00 PM CDT | F1 | Washington, FL | 2.7 | 100 | $300,000 | ||
| October 13 | 1:30 AM EDT | F1 | Franklin, FL | 0.2 | 50 | $330,000 |
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.