EF0 tornado, Blue River, Indiana, October 15, 2021

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   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 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.

Rating

EF0

Date

October 15, 2021

Touchdown

10:12 PM EDT (02:12 UTC)

Lifted

10:15 PM EDT (02:15 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

2.7 miles (4.3 km)

Path width

70 yards (64 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Washington County

Touchdown point

38.543, -85.960

Lift-off point

38.546, -85.903

Record number

2110152012-01

13 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS LMK, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 80 mph.

• Several trees mostly rotted knocked down
• One large maple on top of car port
• Power pole snapped and replaced, large root ball uprooted
• Brief tornado ended just passed the power pole before the lake

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

During the night, an area of thunderstorms ahead of a cold front, worked its way east through southern Indiana. The environment became more stable and only marginal shear remained. The environment was looking less favorable for severe weather, but a storm on the leading edge of a storm cluster generated its own shear between the northern edge of outflow dominant storms to the south and the environmental winds ahead of the storm. This resulted in a series of isolated quick spin-up type tornadoes that caused isolated damage in Washington and Scott Counties.

The National Weather Service conducted two storm damage assessment surveys across eastern Washington County Indiana, from storms Friday evening October 15 around 1015 pm. The second survey came about from new reports of damage along the Blue River east of New Pekin. ||The initial touchdown was just west of Bethel Church Road near the Blue River. This consisted of concentrated softwood and some hardwood tree damage. Drone imagery showed more significant amounts of tree damage, with many maple, elm, and cedar trees uprooted and twisted. Fallen trees were facing in a north, northeasterly, easterly, and southeasterly direction. Wind speeds of 80 mph were fairly consistent within the track with a width of 70 yards.||The tornado lifted from time to time and was intermittent along the entire path.||The survey team found winds of 70 to 75 mph in a cyclonic manner across a very small portion of eastern Washington County near Pine Hill Lake. A very narrow area of tree and roof damage occurred just southwest of the lake with a width of 60 yards. Most of the tree damage happened at 30 to 70 feet off the ground.||Trees were facing to the north, northeast, and easterly direction. One car port had significant damage from large, 4-inch oak limbs falling on it. Minor roof damage occurred, including shingles and large limbs falling on a few homes. One tree fell on a homeowner's pick-up truck, resulting in significant damage.||More substantial wind damage occurred at 10850 East Blue River Road. A large jacuzzi was picked up and thrown 10 yards. The hot tub was not full of water but weighed a substantial amount. Cedar trees were snapped and twisted and numerous maple and sycamore trees were uprooted, snapped and twisted all across the property.||Drone footage showed trees going in multiple directions, especially from the north through southeasterly directions. Trees that were leaning were facing generally to the south. Wind speeds of 80 mph were fairly consistent within the track with a width of 70 yards. ||The tornado lifted on the very back edge of the wooded property at 10850 East Blue River Road. Overlaying radar imagery with the damage track showed that the damage was consistent around a cyclonic swirl, on a line segment within some heavy rain bands.

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

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.

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. The outlook in force was issued at 00:52 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.

The Louisville radar (KLVX), 63 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:11 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 2021 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

11 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.