Tornadoes · United States · Illinois · 2018

EF0 tornado, German Corner, Illinois, June 26, 2018

This EF0 tornado ran 0.0 miles across Henry County on June 26, 2018, touching down at 8:23 PM CDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody.

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
June 26, 2018
Touchdown
8:23 PM CDT (01:23 UTC)
Lifted
8:24 PM CDT (01:24 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.0 miles (0.0 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Henry County
Touchdown point
41.317, -90.011
Lift-off point
41.317, -90.011
Record number
1806261923-01

The damage survey

1 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS DVN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 80 mph.

  • Brief touchdown tornado with damage to corn and farm machinery rolled over.

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

An area of strong to severe thunderstorms moved from eastern Iowa, across northwest Illinois the afternoon and evening of June 26, 2018. Two brief tornadoes occurred, one in northern Missouri near Memphis, and another in Henry County Illinois, south of of the town of Atkinson, Illinois.

A short path of corn was flattened, and a farm implement was overturned.

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

The warnings

2 minutes of warning. NWS DVN issued a tornado warning for this county at 01:21 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:42 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
18:00 UTC02:28 UTCFlash Flood WatchDVN
01:21 UTC01:42 UTCTornado WarningDVN

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 01:00 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.

Davenport, (KDVN), 00:00Z

1.4 hours before the tornado, 53 km from the path. June 27, 2018.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Davenport, at 00:00Z on 2018-06-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 307 joules per kilogram, CIN -9, lifted condensation level 762 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Davenport, at 00:00Z on 2018-06-27The 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 51 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 20 knots.193958Sfc1 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
307 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-9 J/kg
Surface CAPE
497 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
762 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
51 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
54 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

Davenport, (KDVN), 12:00Z

10.6 hours after it, 53 km from the path. June 27, 2018.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Davenport, at 12:00Z on 2018-06-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 18 joules per kilogram, CIN -29, lifted condensation level 750 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Davenport, at 12:00Z on 2018-06-27The 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 54 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 knots.193958Sfc1 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
18 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-29 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
750 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
54 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
101 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Moline (MLI), 44 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
23:25 UTC0° 0 kt1007.8
23:30 UTC0° 0 kt1008.1
23:35 UTC320° 6 kt1008.1
23:40 UTC320° 6 kt1008.1
23:45 UTC340° 8 kt1008.1
23:50 UTC330° 9 kt1008.1RA BR
23:52 UTC7470340° 6 kt1008.1+RA BR
23:54 UTC7370 3 kt1008.1+RA BR
23:55 UTC320° 4 kt1008.1+RA BR
00:00 UTC310° 11 kt1008.1+RA FG
00:02 UTC7067300° 9 kt201008.1+RA FG
00:05 UTC320° 10 kt1008.1+RA FG
00:10 UTC350° 6 kt1007.5+RA BR
00:14 UTC7066350° 3 kt1007.8-RA BR
00:15 UTC0° 0 kt1007.8-RA BR
00:16 UTC70660° 0 kt1007.8-RA BR
00:20 UTC180° 6 kt1007.8
00:25 UTC190° 4 kt1007.8
00:26 UTC7167200° 3 kt1007.8
00:30 UTC200° 4 kt1007.5
00:35 UTC210° 3 kt1007.5
00:40 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
00:45 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
00:50 UTC0° 0 kt1007.8
00:52 UTC72690° 0 kt1007.8
00:55 UTC0° 0 kt1007.8
01:00 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:05 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:10 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:15 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:20 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:25 UTC140° 4 kt1007.5
01:30 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:35 UTC180° 3 kt1007.5
01:40 UTC210° 3 kt1007.5
01:45 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:50 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
01:52 UTC72690° 0 kt1007.5
01:55 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
02:00 UTC0° 0 kt1007.5
02:05 UTC280° 3 kt1007.5
02:10 UTC230° 4 kt1007.5-RA
02:15 UTC210° 4 kt1007.1-RA
02:20 UTC220° 4 kt1007.1-RA
02:25 UTC190° 4 kt1007.1
02:30 UTC200° 5 kt1007.1
02:35 UTC180° 5 kt1007.1
02:40 UTC200° 6 kt1007.1
02:45 UTC210° 6 kt1007.1
02:50 UTC220° 6 kt1007.5
02:52 UTC7169230° 5 kt1007.5
02:55 UTC230° 5 kt1007.5
03:00 UTC220° 5 kt1007.5
03:05 UTC220° 5 kt1007.5
03:10 UTC240° 3 kt1007.8
03:15 UTC240° 4 kt1007.8
03:20 UTC240° 4 kt1007.8

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

The radar

The Quad Cities radar (KDVN), 58 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:23 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
00:40 UTCFUNNEL CLOUD2 E ViolaMercer, ILBRIEF ROTATING WALL CLOUD PRODUCED A FUNNEL, LASTED AROUND 30 SECONDS.

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2018 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 26, 2018

17 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 269:41 AM CDTEF0White, IL0.7100$20,000
June 2610:42 AM CDTEF0Grant, WI0.110
June 2611:30 AM CDTEF0Lafayette, WI0.540$1,000
June 261:44 PM EDTEF1Oldham, KY3.5150$550,000
June 261:09 PM CDTEF0Jackson, MO3.4100$150,000
June 262:24 PM CDTEF0Lafayette, WI1.847$15,000
June 263:26 PM CDTEF0Scotland, MO0.210
June 263:30 PM CDTEF1St. Clair, MO2.5200
June 265:28 PM CDTEF0Kane, IL0.020
June 266:39 PM CDTEF0Butler, KS1.9100
June 266:42 PM CDTEF0Butler, KS0.550
June 266:53 PM CDTEF0Will, IL0.125
June 266:54 PM CDTEF1Will, IL1.1100$30,000
June 267:18 PM CDTEF3Greenwood, KS9.25008$14 million
June 268:27 PM CDTEF1Champaign, IL3.975$37,000
June 268:53 PM CDTEF0Morton, ND0.150
June 269:02 PM CDTEF0Butler, KS0.550

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.