EF1 tornado, (Ugn) Waukegan Airport to Beach Park, Illinois, September 3, 2019

1. EF065 to 85 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado

   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

EF1

Date

September 3, 2019

Touchdown

6:39 PM CDT (23:39 UTC)

Lifted

6:43 PM CDT (23:43 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

3.1 miles (5.0 km)

Path width

200 yards (183 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

1

County

Lake County

Touchdown point

42.411, -87.862

Lift-off point

42.403, -87.803

Record number

1909031739-01

A thunderstorm moved across far northeast Illinois during the evening of September 3rd producing a tornado.

A tornado touched downed just west of Twyford Road and moved east southeast through parts of Waukegan. Damage from the tornado was minor to commercial buildings and residences, including windows blown out, minor roof damage, fence destruction and damage to a gas station canopy. A vehicle was flipped over just east of the intersection of York House Road and Lewis Avenue where one minor injury occurred. Numerous trees were blown down or suffered heavy branch damage. The tornado was at its widest and strongest in the latter half of its path. Estimated peak winds for this tornado were 90 mph. A one mile stretch between the last damage point and the Lake Michigan shore was unable to be surveyed due a nature area in the Illinois Beach Nature Preserve. A waterspout was reported just off shore and so by interpolation, the path for this tornado was continued to the Lake Michigan shore.

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, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 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), 86 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:38 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 2019 tornado in IllinoisEvery tornado in Illinois since 1950Warnings in force in Illinois nowThe forecast where you are

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.