Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2013

EF0 tornado, Plantation, Florida, July 23, 2013

This EF0 tornado ran 0.0 miles across Broward County on July 23, 2013, touching down at 12:45 PM EDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $10,000 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
July 23, 2013
Touchdown
12:45 PM EDT (16:45 UTC)
Lifted
12:46 PM EDT (16:46 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.0 miles (0.0 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$10,000
County
Broward County
Touchdown point
26.087, -80.175
Lift-off point
26.087, -80.175
Record number
1307231045-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A moist and unstable airmass was over South Florida which produced scattered showers and thunderstorms during the afternoon.

Broadcast Media and Law Enforcement reported a weak tornado touched down at Power Catamarans of South Florida damaging dinghies and watercraft. A couple of boats were overturned in the marina with one boat having a bent up shade and a catamaran was pushed into a fence. The force of the tornado also picked up three small Livingston catamarans and blew them across the yard along with a couple more on a rack. There was also one downed power line and some flashing was torn from a building.

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 16:26 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

4.8 hours before the tornado, 32 km from the path. July 23, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 12:00Z on 2013-07-23Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2189 joules per kilogram, CIN -5, lifted condensation level 681 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, Miami, FL at 12:00Z on 2013-07-23The 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 -19 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 5 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
2189 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-5 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2257 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
681 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
6 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-19 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
30 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Miami, FL (KMFL), 00:00Z

7.2 hours after it, 32 km from the path. July 24, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Miami, FL at 00:00Z on 2013-07-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1802 joules per kilogram, CIN -12, lifted condensation level 1031 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, Miami, FL at 00:00Z on 2013-07-24The 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 76 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
1802 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-12 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2308 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1031 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
7 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
76 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
60 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Miami radar (KAMX), 58 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 16:46 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
16:45 UTCTORNADO2 Ssw Fort LauderdaleBroward, FLA VERY WEAK TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN ALONG STATE ROAD 84 JUST NORTHWEST OF THE INTERSTATE 95/595 JUNCTION NEAR MARINA MILE. THREE SMALL BOATS WERE OVERTURNED IN THE MARINA, A LARGER FISHING BOAT WAS THROWN AGAINST A FENCE, O
16:50 UTCLIGHTNING3 W Fort LauderdaleBroward, FL*** 1 INJ *** A CRANE OPERATOR WAS INJURED WHEN HIS CRANE WAS STRUCK BY LIGHTNING AT 3601 NW 4 ST IN LAUDERHILL. THE MAN WAS TAKEN TO A NEARBY HOSPITAL AND WAS IN FAIR CONDITION.
17:00 UTCTORNADO2 Ssw Fort LauderdaleBroward, FLA VERY WEAK TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN ALONG STATE ROAD 84 JUST NORTHWEST OF THE INTERSTATE 95/595 JUNCTION NEAR MARINA MILE. ONLY A COUPLE OF SMALL BOATS WERE OVERTURNED IN THE MARINA.

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2013 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of July 23, 2013

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
July 235:22 PM EDTEF0Columbiana, OH3.175$25,000
July 2312:06 AM CDTEF1Wagoner, OK3.5850$180,000

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.