EF0 tornado, Buena Vista, Illinois, June 1, 2009

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

June 1, 2009

Touchdown

4:30 PM CDT (21:30 UTC)

Lifted

4:31 PM CDT (21:31 UTC)

On the ground

1 minutes

Path length

0.3 miles (0.5 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$100,000

County

Stephenson County

Touchdown point

42.446, -89.684

Lift-off point

42.446, -89.674

Record number

0906011530-01

A stalled frontal boundary draped from the Iowa-Missouri border into Illinois resulted in the development of showers and thunderstorms on June 1. After some peeks of sunshine during the early afternoon, severe thunderstorms erupted mainly along and south of Highway 34, producing large hail and wind gusts over 58 mph. One lone storm in northern Stephenson County produced some damaging winds and a tornado near Orangeville, IL. Heavy rains also produced some flash flooding in Hancock County Illinois.

A tornado briefly touched down about 2 miles southwest of Orangeville, IL around 430 pm June 1. Several trees were snapped at the trunk. Tall grasses along W Brush Creek Rd were laying down to the east. A tin roof was blown off of a shed to the east. A witness inside a barn described windows blown in, paint sandblasted off walls, and hay blowing out the west door being carried north of barn. An empty grain wagon was pushed 25 yards northeast of barn. Four calf huts were picked up by the wind, moved, and one was apparently lofted a half mile down the road to the northeast. Sheet metal was bent and twisted inside a grain bin. A hay conveyor rolled twice. A witness described heavy rain, then mud preceding wind. Another witness described seeing a funnel cloud shape before experiencing strong winds. They were unable to determine if there was rotation due to the wind speed and rain. A pine tree was uprooted along with small branches down. Time estimated.

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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 20:18 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.

The Milwaukee radar (KMKX), 109 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:30 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 2009 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

3 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.