Tornadoes · United States · Indiana · 2016

EF1 tornado, Whitestown, Indiana, April 28, 2016

This EF1 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Boone County on April 28, 2016, touching down at 4:26 PM EDT and reaching 40 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $35,000 of property damage.

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 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.

The record

Rating
EF1
Date
April 28, 2016
Touchdown
4:26 PM EDT (20:26 UTC)
Lifted
4:27 PM EDT (20:27 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
40 yards (37 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$35,000
County
Boone County
Touchdown point
39.990, -86.306
Lift-off point
39.989, -86.303
Record number
1604281426-01

The damage survey

2 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS IND, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 100 mph.

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 low pressure moved across central Indiana during the afternoon of the 28th. Scattered thunderstorms developed, producing a tornado and large hail.

This EF-1 tornado, with winds estimated at 100 mph, moved from 2.5 miles ESE of Whitestown to 2.6 miles ESE of Whitestown. The tornado demolished a small barn and did some minor damage to a home.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
19:26 UTC19:45 UTCTornado WarningIND

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 20:07 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.

Lincoln, IL (KILX), 12:00Z

8.4 hours before the tornado, 196 km from the path. April 28, 2016.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lincoln, IL at 12:00Z on 2016-04-28Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -86662, lifted condensation level 879 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Lincoln, IL at 12:00Z on 2016-04-28The 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 70 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 31 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-86662 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
879 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
31 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
9 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
70 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
144 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Lincoln, IL (KILX), 00:00Z

3.6 hours after it, 196 km from the path. April 29, 2016.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lincoln, IL at 00:00Z on 2016-04-29Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -106643, lifted condensation level 1314 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Lincoln, IL at 00:00Z on 2016-04-29The 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 11 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-106643 J/kg
Surface CAPE
31 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1314 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
44 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
11 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
145 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Indianapolis Exec (TYQ), 6 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
18:35 UTC64.459.5410° 4 kt1010.2
18:55 UTC6560.2640° 9 kt1009.5-RA
19:15 UTC62.7859.3650° 11 kt1009.8
19:35 UTC60.858.28320° 12 kt181010.5+RA
19:55 UTC6159360° 7 kt1010.5-RA
20:15 UTC62.4259.1830° 10 kt1010.5BR
20:35 UTC62.4258.8220° 7 kt1010.8
20:55 UTC61.3458.2820° 6 kt1011.2
21:15 UTC61.758.2820° 8 kt1011.5
21:35 UTC62.4258.2820° 8 kt1011.5
21:55 UTC60.625740° 7 kt1012.2
22:15 UTC60.856.6620° 8 kt1012.2

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

The radar

The Indianapolis radar (KIND), 31 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:23 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
19:11 UTCFUNNEL CLOUD2 Nw LebanonBoone, INFUNNEL CLOUD REPORTED
19:26 UTCTORNADO2 E WhitestownBoone, INTORNADO REPORTED ON GROUND NEAR 800E AND 300S
19:32 UTCFUNNEL CLOUD3 E WhitestownBoone, INREPORTED ONE HALF MILE NORTHEAST OF COUNTY ROADS 800E AND 500S

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2016 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 28, 2016

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 285:40 PM CDTEF0Hall, TX0.110

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.