Tornadoes · United States · Indiana · 2024
EF1 tornado, Paradise, Indiana, May 14, 2024
This EF1 tornado ran 0.4 miles across Warrick County on May 14, 2024, touching down at 5:14 PM CDT and reaching 75 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $25,000 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.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- May 14, 2024
- Touchdown
- 5:14 PM CDT (22:14 UTC)
- Lifted
- 5:15 PM CDT (22:15 UTC)
- On the ground
- 1 minutes
- Path length
- 0.4 miles (0.6 km)
- Path width
- 75 yards (69 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $25,000
- County
- Warrick County
- Touchdown point
- 37.959, -87.385
- Lift-off point
- 37.964, -87.385
- Record number
- 2405141614-01
The damage survey
6 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS PAH, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 94 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
Surface low pressure was drifting across the Quad State on the 14th. Showers and thunderstorms developed in the afternoon to evening with Southwest Indiana seeing storms drift slowly northeastward. CAPE values around 1000 J/kg dropped off after sunset. Lapse rates were around 6.5 C/km, and shear was limited to around 25 kts. Despite also producing cold air funnels, one storm produced a brief EF-1 tornado on the northeast side of Newburgh. Torrential rainfall of 3-5.5 inches fell in Warrick County, producing widespread flash flooding for the late afternoon and evening hours.
A brief EF-1 tornado with estimated peak winds of 94 mph struck the northeast side of Newburgh, IN. The great majority of the damage was from uprooted trees and downed large tree limbs in a south to north path between Marywood Drive and Oakdale Drive. A couple homes also had fascia and gutter damage. NWS Paducah would like to thank the Warrick County Emergency Management Agency for surveying the damage path.
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) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21:49 UTC | 00:15 UTC | Flood Advisory | PAH |
| 23:17 UTC | 02:15 UTC | Flash Flood Warning | PAH |
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 Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:50 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.
Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 12:00Z
10.2 hours before the tornado, 215 km from the path. May 14, 2024.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 25 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -177 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 45 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 714 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 45 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 6 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 28 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 85 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.0 K/km
Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 00:00Z
1.8 hours after it, 215 km from the path. May 15, 2024.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -33871 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1532 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 826 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 18 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 4 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -4 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 3 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- -0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 6.5 K/km
The radar
The Evansville,IN radar (KVWX), 45 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:13 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) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22:13 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 1 Ne Newburgh | Warrick, IN | Several large tree limbs down at Sharon Road and Kenwood Drive. Time estimated from radar. |
| 22:14 UTC | TORNADO | 1 Ne Newburgh | Warrick, IN | A brief EF-1 tornado with estimated peak winds of 94 mph struck the northeast side of Newburgh, IN. The great majority of the damage was from uprooted trees and downed large tree limbs in a south to north path between Ma |
| 22:28 UTC | TSTM WND GST 51 | 1 Nne Newburgh | Warrick, IN | |
| 23:20 UTC | FLOOD | 2 Nw Newburgh | Warrick, IN | Roadway flooding occurred near Grimm Road and Willow Pond Road. |
| 23:20 UTC | FLOOD | 3 Ssw Chandler | Warrick, IN | Flooding occurred on Coal Mine Road near Telephone Road. |
| 23:20 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | 2 Nw Newburgh | Warrick, IN | Roadway flooding occurred near Grimm Road and Willow Pond Road. |
| 23:20 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | 3 Ssw Chandler | Warrick, IN | Roadway flooding occurred on Coal Mine Road near Telephone Road. |
| 00:39 UTC | FLASH FLOOD | 2 N Newburgh | Warrick, IN | Water rising into neighborhoods, businesses and farmland along SR 66. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2024 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 14, 2024
9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 14 | 4:39 PM EDT | EF0 | Marlboro, SC | 1.6 | 150 | $2,000 | ||
| May 14 | 4:16 PM CDT | EF0 | Lawrence, TN | 3.6 | 100 | $250,000 | ||
| May 14 | 3:40 PM MDT | Unrated | Kit Carson, CO | 0.3 | 15 | |||
| May 14 | 5:52 PM EDT | EF0 | Robeson, NC | 0.1 | 30 | |||
| May 14 | 6:00 PM EDT | EF0 | Robeson, NC | 5.2 | 40 | $10,000 | ||
| May 14 | 6:06 PM EDT | EF0 | Robeson, NC | 0.2 | 150 | $5,000 | ||
| May 14 | 6:10 PM EDT | EF1 | Marion, SC | 2.0 | 80 | $200,000 | ||
| May 14 | 7:52 PM EDT | EF0 | Columbus, NC | 2.2 | 40 | $20,000 | ||
| May 14 | 8:03 PM EDT | EF0 | Columbus, NC | 6.0 | 40 | $4,000 |
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.