F2 tornado, Francesville to Culver, Indiana, April 26, 1994

1. F040 to 72 mph

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

2. F173 to 112 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. F2113 to 157 mphthis tornado

   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. 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.

5. F4207 to 260 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. 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.

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

F2

Date

April 26, 1994

Touchdown

9:45 PM EST (02:45 UTC)

Path length

20.0 miles (32.2 km)

Path width

440 yards (402 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$50,000 to $500,000

Counties

Pulaski, Fulton and Marshall counties

Touchdown point

40.980, -86.870

Lift-off point

41.200, -86.400

Record number

244

The tornado touched down near Francesville in southwest Pulaski County then tracked northeast across the entire county entering extreme northeast Fulton county 1.1 miles northeast of Monterey at 2313 EST. It then crossed into extreme southwest Marshall county 3.7 miles southwest of Culver at 2315 EST and lifted at 2321 EST about 2.5 miles southeast of Culver. The tornado destroyed five farm buildings, and damaged numerous others. One home was destroyed. A mobile home was lifted off the ground and placed on top of a car. Dozens of large trees were uprooted at Tippecanoe River State Park north of Winamac. The tornado damage path was intermittent.

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

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:20 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.

Grissom Afb/Peru (GUS), 64 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The live radar over the trackEvery 1994 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

65 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 66 of them

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.