Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2010

EF0 tornado, Edgewater to Coronado Beach, Florida, August 7, 2010

From Edgewater to Coronado Beach, this EF0 tornado ran 0.8 miles across Volusia County on August 7, 2010, touching down at 1:10 PM EDT and reaching 40 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $58,000 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.

  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
August 7, 2010
Touchdown
1:10 PM EDT (17:10 UTC)
Lifted
1:11 PM EDT (17:11 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.8 miles (1.3 km)
Path width
40 yards (37 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$58,000
County
Volusia County
Touchdown point
29.001, -80.884
Lift-off point
29.012, -80.880
Record number
1008071110-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A waterspout formed within a thunderstorm over the intracoastal river, then moved onshore the adjacent barrier island in New Smyrna Beach and produced minor damage as it crossed to the Atlantic coast.

As a line of thunderstorms moved from the mainland to the Volusia County coast, a|waterspout formed over Browns Bay, a marshy area east of the intracoastal river. The waterspout moved onshore the adjacent barrier island in New Smyrna Beach and produced minor damage as it crossed to the Atlantic coast. Six homes received minor damage, and one home experienced more extensive damage as a small part of roofing plywood and shingles was removed. Insulation was blown to the ocean about a half mile away. See separate waterspout entry.

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 16:05 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

5.2 hours before the tornado, 70 km from the path. August 7, 2010.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 12:00Z on 2010-08-07Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 304 joules per kilogram, CIN -66, lifted condensation level 933 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 2010-08-07The 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 7 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 17 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
304 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-66 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1350 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
933 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
2 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
7 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
24 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

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

6.8 hours after it, 70 km from the path. August 8, 2010.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cape Canaveral, FL at 00:00Z on 2010-08-08Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1343 joules per kilogram, CIN -19, lifted condensation level 718 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 2010-08-08The 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 36 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 28 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
1343 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-19 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2953 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
718 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
28 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
9 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
36 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
70 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.1
Supercell composite
1.5
0-3 km lapse rate
5.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Melbourne radar (KMLB), 102 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 17:08 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
17:10 UTCTSTM WND DMG3 Nne EdgewaterVolusia, FLSIGNIFICANT ROOF DAMAGE TO ONE HOME NEAR SAXON DRIVE AND SANDPIPER WAY. MODERATE DAMAGE TO ROOFS OF SURROUNDING HOMES.
17:10 UTCTORNADO 02 Se New Smyrna BeachVolusia, FLEFO TOUCHDOWN NEAR SANDPIPER AVENUE AND SAXON DRIVE. EXTENSIVE ROOF DAMAGE INCLUDING ONE HOME HAVING A QUARTER OF THEIR ROOF RIPPED OFF. A SURFER SPOTTED INSULATION BEING BLOWN TO THE OCEAN ABOUT 1/2 MILE AWAY. PLYWOOD W

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2010 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 7, 2010

10 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 76:02 PM EDTEF0Palm Beach, FL1.830
August 76:25 PM CDTEF0Wilkin, MN to ND0.225
August 76:25 PM CDTEF4Tyler–Doran tornado, North Dakota and Minnesota5.0600
August 76:46 PM CDTEF0Wilkin, MN1.015
August 76:58 PM CDTEF1Otter Tail, MN4.075
August 77:33 PM CDTEF0Otter Tail, MN0.225
August 77:35 PM CDTEF1Grant, MN21.0100$25,000
August 77:59 PM CDTEF1Otter Tail, MN2.275
August 711:37 PM CDTEF0Polk, WI2.81001$100,000
August 711:57 PM CDTEF1Barron, WI3.2125$250,000

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.