Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2005

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

From Miami Beach to Miami, this F0 tornado ran 2.0 miles across Miami-Dade County on September 10, 2005, touching down at 8:59 PM EDT and reaching 50 yards wide. 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
September 10, 2005
Touchdown
8:59 PM EDT (00:59 UTC)
Path length
2.0 miles (3.2 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Miami-Dade County
Touchdown point
25.800, -80.120
Lift-off point
25.800, -80.120
Record number
409

What the Weather Service recorded

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.

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
00:43 UTC01:45 UTCMarine WarningMFL
02:19 UTC03:15 UTCMarine WarningMFL

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 19:55 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.

Miami, FL (KMFL), 00:00Z

1.0 hours before the tornado, 17 km from the path. September 11, 2005.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 00:00Z on 2005-09-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1715 joules per kilogram, CIN -16, lifted condensation level 1061 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, Miami, FL at 00:00Z on 2005-09-11The 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 -2 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 14 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
1715 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-16 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2451 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1061 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
14 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-2 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
55 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Miami, FL (KMFL), 12:00Z

11.0 hours after it, 17 km from the path. September 11, 2005.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 12:00Z on 2005-09-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 792 joules per kilogram, CIN -50, lifted condensation level 821 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, Miami, FL at 12:00Z on 2005-09-11The 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 10 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
792 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-50 J/kg
Surface CAPE
454 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
821 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
6 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
10 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
43 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Miami radar (KAMX), 36 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:58 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.

What was reported nearby

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

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
00:57 UTCTORNADOMiami BeachMiami-Dade, FLOBSERVED BY SEVERAL OFF-DUTY NWS METEOROLOGISTS.
00:57 UTCTORNADOMiami BeachMiami-Dade, FL
01:00 UTCTORNADOFisher IslandMiami-Dade, FLROOF DAMAGE TO SEVERAL CONDOS. REPORT RELAYED BY CBS4 TV METEOROLOGIST. TIME ESTIMATED BASED ON OTHER REPORTS.
01:09 UTCTORNADODowntown MiamiMiami-Dade, FLLAW ENFORCEMENT REPORTED TORNADO MOVING ONSHORE AT THE BAYFRONT NEAR DOWNTOWN MIAMI. NO REPORTS OF DAMAGE HAVE BEEN RECEIVED FROM THIS AREA SO FAR.
01:23 UTCHAIL 0.75PennsucoMiami-Dade, FL
01:39 UTCTORNADO3 Nw Downtown MiamiMiami-Dade, FLCOMMERCIAL BUILDING LOST ROOF ON 2700 BLOCK OF NW 17TH AVE. TREES DOWN ON WIRES. TRAFFIC LIGHTS DOWN AT INTERSECTIONS OF NW 11TH AVE/29TH ST AND NW 17TH AVE AND 28TH ST.

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

This ground now

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

The other tornadoes of September 10, 2005

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
September 109:09 PM EDTF0Miami-Dade, FL3.050

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.