Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2009
EF0 tornado, Cape Coral, Florida, August 16, 2009
This EF0 tornado ran 0.4 miles across Lee County on August 16, 2009, touching down at 4:42 PM EDT and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $103,000 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 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
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
- EF0
- Date
- August 16, 2009
- Touchdown
- 4:42 PM EDT (20:42 UTC)
- Lifted
- 4:45 PM EDT (20:45 UTC)
- On the ground
- 3 minutes
- Path length
- 0.4 miles (0.6 km)
- Path width
- 20 yards (18 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $103,000
- County
- Lee County
- Touchdown point
- 26.685, -81.983
- Lift-off point
- 26.688, -81.979
- Record number
- 0908161442-01
What the Weather Service recorded
A developing area of low pressure was in place over the eastern Gulf of Mexico, sending bands of showers and thunderstorms over the area and increasing winds across the area. With the storms, an isolated tornado briefly touched down in Cape Coral.
Twenty three homes were damaged from an EF-0 tornado with winds estimated at 70 to 80mph. Eleven homes suffered the most damage mainly to roofs, fascia, soffits, broken windows, and outdoor equipment such as satellite and electric systems.
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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20:44 UTC | 21:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | 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 20:01 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), 12:00Z
8.7 hours before the tornado, 121 km from the path. August 16, 2009.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 206 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -87 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 351 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 921 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 19 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 24 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 203 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 237 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.1 K/km
Tampa Bay, FL (KTBW), 00:00Z
3.3 hours after it, 121 km from the path. August 17, 2009.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1924 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -35 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1252 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 817 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 18 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 13 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 24 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 46 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.3
- Supercell composite
- 1.8
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.5 K/km
The surface observations
Fort Myers/Page Field (FMY), 16 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18:53 UTC | 92 | 72 | 120° 6 kt | 1017.6 | ||
| 19:53 UTC | 91 | 72 | 80° 5 kt | 1016.6 | ||
| 20:12 UTC | 86 | 69.8 | 90° 3 kt | 1016.6 | -TSRA | |
| 20:53 UTC | 78 | 69 | 280° 6 kt | 1016.9 | VCTS | |
| 21:25 UTC | 78.8 | 69.8 | 0° 0 kt | 1016.9 | ||
| 21:53 UTC | 78 | 71 | 310° 9 kt | 1016.9 |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Tampa radar (KTBW), 121 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:42 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20:42 UTC | TORNADO | Cape Coral | Lee, FL | SEVERAL HOMES IN THE AREA OF SANATA BARBARA BLVD. NORTH AND KISMET PARKWAY HAD MINOR DAMAGE...MAINLY TO ROOF SHINGLES AND OR POOL CAGES. ONE COMPACT CAR WAS FLIPPED UP ON THE HOOD AND AGAINST A HOUSE, WITH NO DAMAGE TO T |
| 20:42 UTC | TORNADO | N Cape Coral | Lee, FL | PUBLIC REPORTS OF TORNADO TOUCHDOWN IN CAPE CORAL AREA |
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.