Tornadoes · United States · Florida · 2020
EF1 tornado, Hamburg to Cherry Lake, Florida, November 30, 2020
From Hamburg to Cherry Lake, this EF1 tornado ran 5.5 miles across Madison County on November 30, 2020, touching down at 3:10 AM EST and reaching 475 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $100,000 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 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
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
- EF1
- Date
- November 30, 2020
- Touchdown
- 3:10 AM EST (08:10 UTC)
- Lifted
- 3:18 AM EST (08:18 UTC)
- On the ground
- 8 minutes
- Path length
- 5.5 miles (8.9 km)
- Path width
- 475 yards (434 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $100,000
- County
- Madison County
- Touchdown point
- 30.592, -83.522
- Lift-off point
- 30.637, -83.445
- Record number
- 2011300210-01
The damage survey
13 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS TAE, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 107 mph.
- Large pine branches down near home. No damage to home. Likely end point.
- Tight swath of numerous snapped pine trees. Narrowly missed mobile home.
- Outbuilding was metal roof panels blown southwestward.
- Grain bin destroyed. Multiple farm structures severely damaged.
Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.
What the Weather Service recorded
A cold front brought a round of showers and thunderstorms to the area. One storm produced a tornado as it moved through Madison county with some damage, resulting in damage to farm buildings.
This tornado initially touched down near NW Little Cat Road in Madison County. Significant tree damage and minor structural damage was noted at a home along County Road 150. The tree damage intensified as the tornado moved northeast across a quail farm along Boggy Bay Road. Significant tree damage and damage to farm outbuildings suggests EF-1 intensity. This was the tornado's widest point. The path narrowed as it crossed County Road 253 where a significant number of snapped pine trees was noted. The tornado then weakened, with no other known structural damage, before lifting just southwest of State Road 53 near the Florida-Georgia line. Maximum winds are estimated to be 105 mph with a maximum width of 475 yards. Thanks to Madison County Emergency Management and Florida Division of Emergency Management for help with the survey.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 07:52 UTC | 08:28 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TAE |
| 08:10 UTC | 09:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | TAE |
| 08:12 UTC | 08:48 UTC | Tornado Warning | TAE |
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 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.
Tallahassee Rgnl, FL (KTLH), 00:00Z
8.2 hours before the tornado, 82 km from the path. November 30, 2020.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 7 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -68 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 628 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 70 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 31 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 365 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 478 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.0 K/km
Tallahassee Rgnl, FL (KTLH), 12:00Z
3.8 hours after it, 82 km from the path. November 30, 2020.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -2 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 21 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 794 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 64 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 28 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -225 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- -97 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 2.7 K/km
The radar
The Moody AFB radar (KVAX), 55 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 08:08 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) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 08:00 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 Se Aucilla | Madison, FL | A TREE BLOCKED THE RIGHT LANE AND PARTIALLY THE LEFT LANE OF I-10 EASTBOUND NEAR MM236 DURING THE OVERNIGHT STORMS. |
| 08:10 UTC | TORNADO | 1 Nnw Hamburg | Madison, FL | BEGINNING POINT OF EF1 TORNADO. MAX WINDS ARE ESTIMATED TO BE 105 MPH WITH A MAX WIDTH OF 475 YARDS. |
| 08:18 UTC | TORNADO | 4 Nnw Cherry Lake | Madison, FL | END POINT OF EF1 TORNADO. MAX WINDS ARE ESTIMATED TO BE 105 MPH WITH A MAX WIDTH OF 475 YARDS. |
| 08:20 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 Nne Hamburg | Madison, FL | REPORTS OF STRUCTURAL DAMAGE AS WELL AS POWER LINES AND TREES DOWN. (POSSIBLE TORNADO). |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2020 tornado in FloridaEvery tornado in Florida since 1950Warnings in force in Florida nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of November 30, 2020
4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| November 30 | 6:00 AM EST | Unrated | Pinellas, FL | 12.4 | 50 | $1,000 | ||
| November 30 | 2:37 PM EST | EF1 | Cecil, MD | 3.4 | 75 | |||
| November 30 | 3:13 PM EST | EF0 | Caroline, MD | 5.3 | 75 | |||
| November 30 | 3:52 PM EST | EF0 | Montgomery, PA | 0.9 | 100 |
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.