Tornadoes · United States · Indiana · 2006

F0 tornado, San Jacinto, Indiana, August 14, 2006

This F0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Jennings County on August 14, 2006, touching down at 7:59 PM EDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $10,000 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
August 14, 2006
Touchdown
7:59 PM EDT (23:59 UTC)
Path length
0.5 miles (0.8 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$10,000
County
Jennings County
Touchdown point
38.930, -85.520
Lift-off point
38.930, -85.500
Record number
809

What the Weather Service recorded

An isolated severe thunderstorm produced a tornado in Jennings County on 14 August 2006. This was the only severe weather event of the day.

A weak tornado touched down in rural southeast Jennings County near the small town of San Jacinto on the evening of 14 August 2006. The tornado tore half of a tin roof off a farm barn, and downed several trees. It also did superficial trim damage to a home, and flipped a swingset and an old trailer.

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.

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 19:53 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.

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 12:00Z

12.0 hours before the tornado, 158 km from the path. August 14, 2006.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2006-08-14Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 49 joules per kilogram, CIN -27, lifted condensation level 811 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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2006-08-14The 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 85 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 16 knots.1939Sfc1 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
49 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-27 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
811 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
19 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
85 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
116 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 00:00Z

0.0 hours before the tornado, 158 km from the path. August 15, 2006.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2006-08-15Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1418 joules per kilogram, CIN -11, lifted condensation level 781 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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2006-08-15The 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 164 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 32 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
1418 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-11 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2458 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
781 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
19 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
164 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
165 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
1.1
Supercell composite
8.1
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Columbus/Balkala (BAK), 50 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
23:50 UTC73.469.860° 8 kt1012.2

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

The radar

The Indianapolis radar (KIND), 109 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:59 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
00:25 UTCTSTM WND DMG8 Se North VernonJennings, INBARN ROOF BLOWN OFF AND SEVERAL POWER LINES AND TREES DOWN

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2006 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 14, 2006

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 1410:59 AM MDTF0Chaves, NM0.130
August 146:33 PM CDTF0Carlisle, KY0.250

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.