Tornadoes · United States · Indiana · 1997

F0 tornado, Angola Airport, Indiana, May 18, 1997

This F0 tornado ran 1.0 miles across Steuben County on May 18, 1997, touching down at 10:00 PM EST and reaching 200 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $10 million of property damage.

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.

  1. F040 to 72 mphthis tornado

    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 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. 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.

The record

Rating
F0
Date
May 18, 1997
Touchdown
10:00 PM EST (03:00 UTC)
Path length
1.0 miles (1.6 km)
Path width
200 yards (183 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$10 million
County
Steuben County
Touchdown point
42.270, -85.080
Lift-off point
42.280, -85.080
Record number
245

What the Weather Service recorded

Angola Airport had 21 aircraft and 3 hangars damaged. In surrounding area farm buildings, homes and business, utility towers also damaged.

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

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
02:28 UTC03:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningGRR

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. The outlook in force was issued at 06:19 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.

Detroit, MI (KDTX), 00:00Z

3.0 hours before the tornado, 144 km from the path. May 19, 1997.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Detroit, MI at 00:00Z on 1997-05-19Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 17 joules per kilogram, CIN -791, lifted condensation level 754 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°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, Detroit, MI at 00:00Z on 1997-05-19The 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 296 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 62 knots.19395878Sfc1 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
17 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-791 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
754 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
62 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
28 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
296 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
450 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Detroit, MI (KDTX), 12:00Z

9.0 hours after it, 144 km from the path. May 19, 1997.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Detroit, MI at 12:00Z on 1997-05-19Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 7 joules per kilogram, CIN -76, lifted condensation level 523 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°0°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, Detroit, MI at 12:00Z on 1997-05-19The 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 71 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 44 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
7 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-76 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
523 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
44 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
71 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
137 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Grand Rapids radar (KGRR), 79 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:58 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1997 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 18, 1997

13 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 184:40 PM CDTF1Cedar, IA3.250
May 185:47 PM CDTF0Reno, KS0.550
May 186:07 PM CDTF0Reno, KS0.550
May 184:37 PM PDTF1San Bernardino, CA3.5100
May 186:43 PM CDTF0Reno, KS0.250
May 184:50 PM PDTF1San Bernardino, CA9.040
May 187:18 PM CDTF2Lake, IL6.073
May 188:00 PM CDTF0Scott, IA0.110
May 188:30 PM CDTF0Warren, IL0.110
May 188:55 PM CDTF0Bureau, IL0.110
May 189:19 PM CDTF0Knox, IL0.150
May 189:30 PM ESTF0LaGrange, IN1.01001$1.5 million
May 189:38 PM ESTF0LaGrange, IN1.02001$1.5 million

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.