EF0 tornado, Blue Cypress Lake, Florida, August 18, 2017

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.

Rating

EF0

Date

August 18, 2017

Touchdown

5:40 PM EDT (21:40 UTC)

Lifted

5:43 PM EDT (21:43 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

0.2 miles (0.3 km)

Path width

20 yards (18 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Indian River County

Touchdown point

27.715, -80.686

Lift-off point

27.716, -80.683

Record number

1708181540-01

Two weak tornadoes (landspouts) developed along outflow boundaries ahead of thunderstorms during the late afternoon and early evening. The first tornado developed over a very rural, agricultural area west of Fellsmere in Indian River County and did not produce any damage. The second tornado formed in Rockledge in Brevard County and was responsible for damage to a few homes. Both tornadoes were brief and affected very small areas, but were widely seen as they occurred outside of rain areas.

A sheriff's deputy spotted a tornado (landspout) over an agricultural area west of Fellsmere, about midway between Blue Cypress Lake and County Road 512. A citizen driving several miles away observed and videotaped the tornado moving very slowly eastward, lasting three minutes. The tornado developed along an outflow boundary ahead of a cluster of thunderstorms and was also seen from Blue Cypress Lake and far to the south-southwest from central Okeechobee County. Sheriff Deputies invested the area of the tornado and cloud not find any evidence of damage. The tornado was rated EF-0 with maximum winds estimated below 55 mph.

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

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:24 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 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.

Vero Beach (VRB), 27 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Melbourne radar (KMLB), 44 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:38 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.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

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

The live radar over the trackEvery 2017 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are

7 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.