Tornadoes · United States · Illinois · 2006
F0 tornado, Greenville to Woburn, Illinois, May 24, 2006
From Greenville to Woburn, this F0 tornado ran 1.2 miles across Bond County on May 24, 2006, touching down at 5:53 PM CDT and reaching 75 yards wide. It killed nobody.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
F040 to 72 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
F2113 to 157 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.
F3158 to 206 mph
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
F5261 to 318 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
- F0
- Date
- May 24, 2006
- Touchdown
- 5:53 PM CDT (22:53 UTC)
- Path length
- 1.2 miles (1.9 km)
- Path width
- 75 yards (69 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Bond County
- Touchdown point
- 38.970, -89.370
- Lift-off point
- 38.970, -89.330
- Record number
- 563
What the Weather Service recorded
The first tornado touched down 5 miles north of Greenville, southwest of the intersection of Red Ball Trail and Hastings Cemetery Avenue, just north of Peach Avenue. It blew down several large trees. Three of the trees fell onto a home causing extensive damage. As it traveled to the east it destroyed a machine shed before lifting and dissipating. No injuries were reported.
The second tornado touched down 1.4 miles northwest of Woburn along Hastings Cemetery Avenue. The tornado caused minor roof damage to one home. Otherwise, most of the damage was to trees before it lifted and dissipated. No injuries were reported.
The third and final tornado in Bond County touched down 2.4 miles north of Woburn, just north of the intersection of Woburn Road and Dry Creek Road. There was some damage to a machine shed on a farmstead on Dry Creek Road. Otherwise, the tornado traveled over some forest and mainly open farmland before lifting and dissipating. No injuries were reported.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
2 minutes of warning. NWS LSX issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:51 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:30 UTC.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 19:47 UTC and running to 03:00 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19:47 UTC | 03:00 UTC | Tornado Watch | LSX |
| 22:22 UTC | 23:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | LSX |
| 22:51 UTC | 23:30 UTC | Tornado Warning | LSX |
| 23:06 UTC | 23:34 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | LSX |
| 00:16 UTC | 04:15 UTC | Flash Flood Warning | LSX |
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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. 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.
Lincoln, IL (KILX), 12:00Z
10.9 hours before the tornado, 146 km from the path. May 24, 2006.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -83994 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1421 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 25 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 226 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 204 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 3.9 K/km
Lincoln, IL (KILX), 00:00Z
1.1 hours after it, 146 km from the path. May 25, 2006.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1105 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -58 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1122 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1025 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 40 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 32 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 210 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 288 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 1.5
- Supercell composite
- 7.2
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.8 K/km
The radar
The St Louis radar (KLSX), 119 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:53 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21:23 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Palmer | Christian, IL | POWER LINES DOWN IN PLAMER. |
| 21:27 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Morrisonville | Christian, IL | POWER LINES DOWN. |
| 21:50 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 W Pana | Christian, IL | WIND DAMAGE IN ROSAMOND...NUMEROUS TREES BLOWN DOWN AND SIDING ON HOUSE DAMAGE. BETWEEN 450 AND 505 PM. |
| 21:56 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Bethalto | Madison, IL | |
| 22:00 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 1 E Roxana | Madison, IL | NUMEROUS LARGE TREE LIMBS DOWN |
| 22:00 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Nokomis | Montgomery, IL | WINDS ESTIMATED OVER 60MPH...NUMEROUS TREE BRANCHES AND WHOLE TREES BLOWN OVER. |
| 22:00 UTC | HAIL 0.88 | Mount Olive | Macoupin, IL | |
| 22:34 UTC | HAIL 1.75 | Edwardsville | Madison, IL | |
| 22:40 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 4 N Greenville | Bond, IL | POWER LINES DOWNED. |
| 22:54 UTC | TORNADO | Woburn | Bond, IL | 2 MILES WEST NORTHWEST OF WOBURN AND TRAVELED JUST NORTH OF TOWN. NUMEROUS TREES UPROOTED...POWER LINES SNAPPED. STRUCTURAL DAMAGE TO SEVERAL RESIDENTIAL HOMES. |
| 22:55 UTC | TORNADO | 1 Ne Woburn | Bond, IL | SEVERAL HOMES SUFFERED EXTENSIVE ROOF DAMAGE 1.5 MILES NORTHEAST OF WOBURN. |
| 23:00 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 1 E Roxana | Madison, IL | NUMEROUS LARGE TREE LIMBS DOWN |
| 23:03 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Greenville | Bond, IL | TELEPHONE POLES SNAPPED OFF...NUMEROUS TREES DOWN...ONE THROUGH THE ROOF OF A HOUSE. FIRE DEPARTMENT ON SCENE. |
| 23:07 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Altamont | Effingham, IL | LARGE MAPLE TREE FELL ON A HOUSE IN ALTAMONT CAUSING MAJOR DAMAGE. SCATTERED POWER LINES DOWN IN EFFINGHAM COUNTY. |
| 23:07 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Altamont | Effingham, IL | TREES DOWN IN TOWN. |
| 23:07 UTC | HAIL 1.75 | 1 N St. Rose | Clinton, IL | |
| 23:10 UTC | HAIL 1.75 | 1 N Jamestown | Bond, IL | |
| 23:14 UTC | HAIL 1 | Keyesport | Clinton, IL | |
| 00:26 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | Smithboro | Bond, IL | 1 TO 2 FEET OF WATER COVERING THE ROAD AT HIGHWAY 140 AND NORTH MAIN STREET. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2006 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 24, 2006
8 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 24 | 4:05 PM CDT | F1 | Christian, IL | 3.8 | 150 | $100,000 | ||
| May 24 | 4:57 PM CDT | F0 | Richland, WI | 1.0 | 15 | $4,000 | ||
| May 24 | 5:10 PM CDT | F0 | Madison, IL | 0.2 | 50 | $20,000 | ||
| May 24 | 5:20 PM CDT | F1 | Kankakee, IL | 1.5 | 50 | $70,000 | ||
| May 24 | 5:35 PM CDT | F0 | Coles, IL | 0.2 | 50 | |||
| May 24 | 5:51 PM CDT | F0 | Bond, IL | 1.3 | 100 | |||
| May 24 | 5:53 PM CDT | F0 | Sauk, WI | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| May 24 | 5:54 PM CDT | F0 | Bond, IL | 1.3 | 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.