Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2009

EF0 tornado, Snow Hill, Florida, April 1, 2009

This EF0 tornado ran 0.0 miles across Seminole County on April 1, 2009, touching down at 4:22 PM EDT and reaching 15 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
April 1, 2009
Touchdown
4:22 PM EDT (20:22 UTC)
Lifted
4:23 PM EDT (20:23 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.0 miles (0.0 km)
Path width
15 yards (14 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Seminole County
Touchdown point
28.690, -81.060
Lift-off point
28.690, -81.060
Record number
0904011422-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Scattered thunderstorms associated with early season sea-breeze convection produced multiple strong storms and an isolated severe storm with hail and a brief tornado touchdown.

An employee at a rural gas station observed a brief tornado touchdown approximately 5 miles to the southeast. This time and location was consistent with strong rotation evident on doppler radar. No damage occurred.

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

The warnings

0 minutes of warning. NWS MLB issued a tornado warning for this county at 20:22 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 20:45 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 17:26 UTC and running to 21:59 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
17:26 UTC21:59 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WatchMLB
19:31 UTC20:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningMLB
20:08 UTC21:04 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningMLB
20:22 UTC20:45 UTCTornado WarningMLB

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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. 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.

Cape Canaveral, FL (KXMR), 12:00Z

8.4 hours before the tornado, 60 km from the path. April 1, 2009.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 12:00Z on 2009-04-01Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 195 joules per kilogram, CIN -71, lifted condensation level 1109 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, Cape Canaveral, FL at 12:00Z on 2009-04-01The 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 24 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 47 knots.19395878Sfc1 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
195 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-71 J/kg
Surface CAPE
580 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1109 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
47 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
7 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
24 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
58 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cape Canaveral, FL (KXMR), 00:00Z

3.6 hours after it, 60 km from the path. April 2, 2009.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 00:00Z on 2009-04-02Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 158 joules per kilogram, CIN -96, lifted condensation level 866 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, Cape Canaveral, FL at 00:00Z on 2009-04-02The 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 178 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 59 knots.19395878Sfc1 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
158 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-96 J/kg
Surface CAPE
229 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
866 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
59 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
178 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
192 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.1
Supercell composite
0.3
0-3 km lapse rate
4.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Sanford/Orlando (SFB), 21 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
18:53 UTC8468280° 4 kt1013.2
19:53 UTC8070360° 9 kt1012.2TSRA
20:01 UTC7771.610° 19 kt241012.5TSRA
20:06 UTC71.666.2340° 11 kt241014.9TSRA BR
20:15 UTC71.664.4 6 kt321012.9TSRA
20:30 UTC71.666.250° 14 kt231013.5-RA
20:37 UTC69.866.250° 16 kt211013.2
20:53 UTC716530° 14 kt201012.5
21:53 UTC736470° 10 kt1012.5

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The radar

The Melbourne radar (KMLB), 75 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:20 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
20:20 UTCHAIL 0.75GenevaSeminole, FL
20:20 UTCTORNADO5 Se GenevaSeminole, FLPOSSIBLE TORNADO REPORTED BY PUBLIC AND RELAYED BY WESH TV CHANNEL 2 IN ORLANDO.

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2009 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

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.