F0 tornado, Miami Beach to Miami, Florida, September 10, 2005

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.

Rating

F0

Date

September 10, 2005

Touchdown

9:09 PM EDT (01:09 UTC)

Path length

3.0 miles (4.8 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Miami-Dade County

Touchdown point

25.770, -80.200

Lift-off point

25.770, -80.200

Record number

408

Tornado first sighted by several off-duty NWS meteorologists over South Beach moving west. Tornado moved over Biscayne Bay before reaching Fisher Island where it damaged roofs to condos.

Tornado was sighted by law enforcement moving onshore near Bayfront Park. Thirty minutes later, emergency management reported roof damage to a commercial building on 2700 block of NW 17th Avenue. Trees fell down on wires, and traffic lights were down at intersections of NW 11 Ave and 29th Street and NW 17th Ave and 28th Street.

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

17 minutes of warning. NWS MFL issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:52 UTC, 17 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:15 UTC.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 00:40 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.

NWS Miami, FL wrote its last area forecast discussion before the tornado touched down at Sep 10, 2:19 PM EDT, 6 hours 50 minutes earlier.

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
219 PM EDT SAT SEP 10 2005

.DISCUSSION...
CURRENTLY, A TROUGH EXTENDS SW FROM OPHELIA ACROSS EXTREME S FLA
AND THIS HAS GENERATED AN INCREASE IN INSTABILITY AND LOW LEVEL
MOISTURE. THUS SCATTERED SHRA BEGINNING TO DEVELOP ALONG THE FAR
SE CST. WILL NO DOUBT SEE SOME LIGHTNING WITH THIS ACTIVITY AS THE
AFTERNOON WEARS ON. LOW LEVEL SFC FLOW HAS ALSO BECOME NE TO SE
BEHIND AND AHEAD OF THIS BOUNDARY AIDING IN SOME COVERGENCE WITH
THE STEERING FLOW STILL SW TO NE. WATER VAPOR SHOWS THIS FEATURE
NICELY WITH DRIER AIR ALOFT PERSISTING BEHIND THE TROUGH AROUND
LAKE OKEE. MAV GUIDANCE NUMBERS STILL LOOK BETTER THAN MET BUT
WILL NUDGE THE POPS UP A PERCENTAGE OR TWO AS THE TROUGH BOUNDARY
STAYS OVER THE SAME VICINITY THROUGH MONDAY. ETA OF COURSE STILL
HAS NO IDEA WHAT TO DO WITH OPHELIA AND ACTUALLY DISSIPATES IT
INTO AN OPEN TROUGH OVER THE SE U.S. SO ANOTHER REASON TO DISCOUNT
ITS NUMBERS FOR POPS. THE GFS DOES SHOW AS OPHELIA STAGGERS TO THE
NE AND THEN S AGAIN THE DRIER AIR COMES BACK TO ENVELOPE ALL OF
THE PENINSULA BY TUESDAY. HOWEVER, I DONT SEE THE REASONING FOR
THIS ERRATIC MOVEMENT AS OPHELIA SHOULD BE GETTING PICKED UP BY THE
UPSTREAM SHORTWAVE BY THAT TIME.

&&

.MARINE...
SWELLS BEGINNING TO AFFECT THE PALM BEACH AND TO A LESSER EXTENT
BROWARD WATERS BUT SEAS SHOULD REMAIN BELOW ADVISORY CRITERIA. THE
GFS STILL BRINGS LARGER SWELLS IN SUNDAY NIGHT INTO MONDAY BUT
THIS IS ALL DEPENDANT ON THE FACT THE GFS STRENGTHENS OPHELIA. SO
WILL LEAVE CURRENT SWELL FORECAST ALONE FOR THE TIME BEING. AT ANY
RATE, SWELLS SHOULD BEGIN TO SUBSIDE BY TUESDAY AS OPHELIA MOVES
INLAND AND WEAKENS.

&&

.FIRE WEATHER...
NO CONCERNS.

&&

.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...
WEST PALM BEACH  78  91  78  91 /  10  20  20  20
FORT LAUDERDALE  77  92  77  91 /  10  20  20  20
MIAMI            78  92  78  92 /  20  30  20  30
NAPLES           75  89  75  90 /  10  20  10  20

&&

.MFL WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
FL...NONE.
AM...NONE.
GM...NONE.
&&

30

HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK FOR SOUTH FLORIDA
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
646 PM EDT SAT SEP 10 2005

FLZ063-066>075-112300-
GLADES-HENDRY-PALM BEACH WESTERN-PALM BEACH EASTERN-
WESTERN COLLIER-EASTERN COLLIER-WESTERN BROWARD-
BROWARD METROPOLITAN-WESTERN DADE-DADE METROPOLITAN-
MAINLAND MONROE-
646 PM EDT SAT SEP 10 2005

THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR SOUTH FLORIDA.

.DAY ONE...TONIGHT

NO HAZARDOUS WEATHER IS EXPECTED AT THIS TIME.

.DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...SUNDAY THROUGH FRIDAY

SWELLS ORIGINATING FROM OLPHELIA WILL CONTINUE TO REACH PORTIONS OF
THE SOUTHEAST FLORIDA COAST OVER THE NEXT FEW DAYS. THEREFORE, RIP
CURRENTS WILL CONTINUE TO BE POSSIBLE ESPECIALLY AT THE PALM BEACH
COUNTY COAST.

.SPOTTER INFORMATION STATEMENT...

SPOTTER ACTIVATION WILL NOT BE NEEDED.

FOR MORE INFORMATION...VISIT THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN
MIAMI WEBSITE AT WWW.MIAMIWEATHER.INFO.

In the hours before

PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
904 PM EDT SAT SEP 10 2005

..TIME...   ...EVENT...      ...CITY LOCATION...     ...LAT.LON...
..DATE...   ....MAG....      ..COUNTY LOCATION..ST.. ...SOURCE....
            ..REMARKS..

0857 PM     TORNADO          MIAMI BEACH             25.81N 80.13W
09/10/2005                   MIAMI-DADE         FL   NWS EMPLOYEE

&&
REPORTED BY MIC MIA

RADER

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.

The Miami radar (KAMX), 28 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:10 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.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

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

The live radar over the trackEvery 2005 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.