Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2008

EF0 tornado, Delray Beach, Florida, June 13, 2008

This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Palm Beach County on June 13, 2008, touching down at 2:10 PM EDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody.

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.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. 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.

  4. 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.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. 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.

  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
EF0
Date
June 13, 2008
Touchdown
2:10 PM EDT (18:10 UTC)
Lifted
2:11 PM EDT (18:11 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.1 miles (0.1 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Palm Beach County
Touchdown point
26.464, -80.058
Lift-off point
26.464, -80.058
Record number
0806131210-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Two short lived and weak waterspouts moved onshore at almost the same time at different locations, one in Miami Beach and the other in Delray Beach.

A small waterspout briefly moved onshore at Delray Beach just north of Atlantic Avenue. The waterspout stirred up some beach umbrellas and blankets, and dissipated shortly after touching land.

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.

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 16:03 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), 12:00Z

6.2 hours before the tornado, 75 km from the path. June 13, 2008.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 12:00Z on 2008-06-13Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1892 joules per kilogram, CIN -5, lifted condensation level 730 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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 2008-06-13The 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 -39 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 7 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
1892 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-5 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1591 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
730 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
7 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-39 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
12 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Miami, FL (KMFL), 00:00Z

5.8 hours after it, 75 km from the path. June 14, 2008.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 00:00Z on 2008-06-14Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1369 joules per kilogram, CIN -7, lifted condensation level 981 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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 2008-06-14The 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 -22 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 15 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
1369 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-7 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1869 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
981 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-22 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-6 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
7.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Miami radar (KAMX), 101 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:09 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2008 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 13, 2008

3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 132:03 PM EDTEF0Miami-Dade, FL0.010
June 134:45 PM EDTEF0Lee, FL0.370$110,000
June 133:55 PM CDTEF1Carter, MO0.6125$50,000

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.