Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2007
EF1 tornado, Land O Lakes, Florida, December 16, 2007
This EF1 tornado ran 3.2 miles across Pasco County on December 16, 2007, touching down at 5:20 AM EST and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $1.0 million of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
EF2111 to 135 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.
EF3136 to 165 mph
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
EF5over 200 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
- EF1
- Date
- December 16, 2007
- Touchdown
- 5:20 AM EST (10:20 UTC)
- Lifted
- 5:27 AM EST (10:27 UTC)
- On the ground
- 7 minutes
- Path length
- 3.2 miles (5.1 km)
- Path width
- 100 yards (91 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $1.0 million
- County
- Pasco County
- Touchdown point
- 28.313, -82.509
- Lift-off point
- 28.333, -82.470
- Record number
- 0712160420-01
What the Weather Service recorded
A strong cold front combined with the remnants of Tropical Depression Olga to produce hazardous weather in west central Florida. The tornado formed from a long-lived supercell thunderstorm that moved onshore from the Gulf of Mexico.
A housing annex worth $750,000 at the county jail was destroyed. The 125 female inmates living in the annex were evacuated before it was destroyed, resulting in zero injuries. There was also roof damage to a fire station, four vehicles were flipped and there were numerous trees and power poles downed.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
12 minutes of warning. NWS TBW issued a tornado warning for this county at 10:08 UTC, 12 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 11:00 UTC.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 02:46 UTC and running to 11:00 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 02:46 UTC | 11:00 UTC | Tornado Watch | TBW |
| 03:55 UTC | 14:00 UTC | Coastal Flood Statement | TBW |
| 08:25 UTC | 09:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TBW |
| 09:10 UTC | 09:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TBW |
| 09:32 UTC | 10:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TBW |
| 09:46 UTC | 10:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | TBW |
| 10:08 UTC | 11:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | TBW |
| 10:45 UTC | 11:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | TBW |
| 13:00 UTC | 23:00 UTC | Lake Wind Advisory | TBW |
| 15:00 UTC | 18:00 UTC | High Surf Advisory | TBW |
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 05:55 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.
Tampa Bay, FL (KTBW), 00:00Z
10.3 hours before the tornado, 69 km from the path. December 16, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 660 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -33 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 845 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 839 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 27 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 129 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 143 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.3
- Supercell composite
- 2.3
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.3 K/km
Tampa Bay, FL (KTBW), 12:00Z
1.7 hours after it, 69 km from the path. December 16, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 314 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -72 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 321 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 590 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 43 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 19 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 19 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 59 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.4 K/km
The radar
The Tampa radar (KTBW), 69 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 10:22 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) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 09:24 UTC | MARINE HAIL 40 | 4 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 35 KNOT WIND GUST AT TAMPA CRUISE TERMINAL 2. |
| 09:24 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 39 | 4 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 34 KNOT WIND GUST AT BERTH 223. |
| 09:30 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 39 | 4 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 34 KNOT WIND GUST AT SEABULK. |
| 09:36 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 46 | 4 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 40 KNOT WIND GUST AT BERTH 223 |
| 09:48 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 51 | 3 W Macdill Air Force B | Gmz830, FL | 44 KNOT WIND GUST AT OLD PORT TAMPA. |
| 09:54 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 41 | 3 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 36 KNOT WIND GUST AT PORT OF TAMPA. |
| 10:00 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 46 | 3 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 40 KNOT WIND GUST AT TAMPA CRUISE TERMINAL 2. |
| 10:15 UTC | TORNADO | 11 Sse Spring Hill | Pasco, FL | SEVERAL CARS OVERTURNED AND PARTS OF A ROOF TORN OFF AT THE LAND O LAKES JAIL ON CENTRAL BLVD IN LAND O LAKES. |
| 10:18 UTC | MARINE TSTM WIND 44 | 3 Se Tampa | Gmz830, FL | 38 KNOT WIND GUST AT PORT OF TAMPA. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2007 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of December 16, 2007
1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| December 16 | 2:45 AM EST | EF1 | Alachua, FL | 0.8 | 200 |
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.