EF1 tornado, Numa to Catlin, Indiana, April 2, 2025

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.

Rating

EF1

Date

April 2, 2025

Touchdown

8:24 PM EDT (00:24 UTC)

Lifted

8:31 PM EDT (00:31 UTC)

On the ground

7 minutes

Path length

10.8 miles (17.3 km)

Path width

120 yards (110 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$200,000

County

Parke County

Touchdown point

39.633, -87.354

Lift-off point

39.682, -87.210

Record number

2504021824-01

45 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS ILX and NWS IND, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 110 mph.

• First picture is looking west at the eastern facing portion of the house. East side of roof completely ripped off and thrown east into neighbors house
• Entire detached garage destroyed with intact walls thrown over shed and into neighbors yard to the ENE. Shed next to it looks untouched. Potential for multiple mesovortices causing this.
• Poorly built old pole barn collapsed
• Two structures heavily damaged. Support beams looked rotted. Brick building in back seems to not be anchored to foundation. Roof not well secured to walls. Therefore keeping tornado rating at EF1.

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

A strong low pressure system generated a line of strong to severe thunderstorms that started in Illinois and moved across central Indiana. Multiple severe storms were embedded within the line and some of these produced tornadoes. Eleven tornadoes impacted central Indiana, ten of which occurred along an overall west-southwest to east-northeast area from north of Terre Haute to north of Muncie. Four of these events, from Hendricks County to Delaware County, were secondary tornadoes that tracked parallel to longer duration tornadoes. Three tornadoes combined to impact western and northern portions of the Indianapolis Metro area, including an EF2 in Hendricks County that caused the episode's only injury. In addition to the tornadoes widespread wind damage occurred with gusts over 80+ mph reported.

This second tornado to impact central Indiana began in a rural field just east of the Numa community. High end EF1 damage was caused to a home and two other buildings along West County Road 900 South where tree damage also occurred. Damage was scattered to the northeast, east, and southeast. The tornado continued northeast passing south of Coxville and then south of Catlin. Only tree damage occurred across these rural areas. The funnel was likely skipping for last few miles before lifting, which confined much of the damage to tree tops. Peak wind gusts were 105 mph.

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

15 minutes of warning. NWS IND issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:09 UTC, 15 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:30 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 20:17 UTC and running to 01:16 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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.15 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 19:57 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.

Terre Haute (HUF), 23 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Indianapolis radar (KIND), 86 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:23 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.

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 2025 tornado in IndianaEvery tornado in Indiana since 1950Warnings in force in Indiana nowThe forecast where you are

87 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

All 88 of them

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.