EF3 tornado, Milan Center to Georgetown, Indiana, August 24, 2016

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 mph

   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 mphthis tornado

   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

EF3

Date

August 24, 2016

Touchdown

5:27 PM EDT (21:27 UTC)

Lifted

5:39 PM EDT (21:39 UTC)

On the ground

12 minutes

Path length

5.2 miles (8.3 km)

Path width

500 yards (457 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Allen County

Touchdown point

41.148, -84.919

Lift-off point

41.195, -84.843

Record number

1608241527-01

76 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS IWX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF3. The highest wind the damage implies is 150 mph.

• Per discussion with survey team - the point was inaccessible.
• centroid tornado path, 100 yd wide, scouring of bean fields, newly built barn partially destroyed with loss of roof. start of tornado is the barn off the road
• house swept off foundation, poorly anchored to foundation, but complete destruction. sill plates only nailed to foundation. Foundation elevated almost 3 feet off the ground. Surrounding DI's had little/no damage in immediate area.
• small shed building wiped off foundation, poorly anchored, structure throw roughly 30 yds relatively in tact

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

A unique combination of extreme low level moisture and a passing upper level disturbance provided the trigger for severe storms. Even though the clouds remained in place for most of the day and it did not get very warm, there was just enough instability to allow storms to develop. There was also a high degree of shear in the lowest levels of the atmosphere, which allowed multiple tornadoes to form. No other forms of severe weather occurred during the event.

The tornado touched down roughly 1/4 mile northeast of the intersection of Doty Road and Roberts Road in a crop field. The tornado tracked generally in a northeasterly direction causing extensive structural damage to homes, barns, trees, and crops throughout the entirety of the path. A poorly anchored home was wiped off its foundation (DI: FR12 DOD: 9). A two-story barn, anchored with re-bar bolts, was leveled and the debris carried upwards of a quarter mile northeast of the original location. One vehicle in the barn was pulled out and severely damaged with two others parked nearby suffering damage from debris. A combine was mangled on the property, with a small dump truck thrown and bent as well as a Lincoln Town Car carried over a quarter mile and dropped into a field. Drone footage showed extensive scouring of corn and a well defined path that extended for several miles. Maximum winds are estimated at 160 mph. The vehicle and farm equipment being carried or twisted may warrant higher speeds, but there are presently no Damage Indicators to rate these.

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

13 minutes of warning. NWS IWX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:14 UTC, 13 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:45 UTC.

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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 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.

Auburn (GWB), 22 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Northern Indiana radar (KIWX), 72 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:25 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 2016 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

21 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.