Tornadoes · United States · Iowa · 2000

F0 tornado, Essex, Iowa, June 13, 2000

This F0 tornado ran 3.0 miles across Page County on June 13, 2000, touching down at 4:20 PM CDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. F040 to 72 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. F173 to 112 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. F2113 to 157 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. F3158 to 206 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. F4207 to 260 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. F5261 to 318 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
F0
Date
June 13, 2000
Touchdown
4:20 PM CDT (21:20 UTC)
Path length
3.0 miles (4.8 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Page County
Touchdown point
40.850, -95.320
Lift-off point
40.870, -95.280
Record number
324

What the Weather Service recorded

This small tornado was originally reported by a law enforcement official. The tornado was also caught on film by a storm chaser.

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

The warnings

9 minutes of warning. NWS OAX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:11 UTC, 9 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:45 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:11 UTC21:45 UTCTornado WarningOAX
22:33 UTC23:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningOAX

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 Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 20:18 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.

Omaha, NE (KOAX), 12:00Z

9.3 hours before the tornado, 103 km from the path. June 13, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Omaha, NE at 12:00Z on 2000-06-13Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 997 joules per kilogram, CIN -254, lifted condensation level 1473 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, Omaha, NE at 12:00Z on 2000-06-13The 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 108 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 29 knots.193958Sfc1 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
997 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-254 J/kg
Surface CAPE
301 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1473 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
108 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
83 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Omaha, NE (KOAX), 00:00Z

2.7 hours after it, 103 km from the path. June 14, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Omaha, NE at 00:00Z on 2000-06-14Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 670 joules per kilogram, CIN -84, lifted condensation level 963 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, Omaha, NE at 00:00Z on 2000-06-14The 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 -161 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 51 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
670 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-84 J/kg
Surface CAPE
420 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
963 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
51 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
23 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-161 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-27 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
-0.3
Supercell composite
-1.8
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Omaha radar (KOAX), 103 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:19 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2000 tornado in IowaEvery tornado in Iowa since 1950Warnings in force in Iowa nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 13, 2000

16 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 133:04 PM CDTF0Otoe, NE3.0150
June 133:10 PM CDTF1Harrison, IA10.6330$30,000
June 133:15 PM CDTF0Chickasaw, IA0.550$10,000
June 133:37 PM CDTF0Otoe, NE0.140
June 133:54 PM CDTF0Cass, NE0.140
June 134:00 PM CDTF0Dodge, NE0.150
June 134:20 PM CDTF1Stutsman, ND5.01001
June 134:26 PM CDTF0Montgomery, IA8.0150
June 134:54 PM CDTF0Ochiltree, TX0.120
June 135:10 PM CDTF1Ellsworth, KS1.0110$10,000
June 135:34 PM CDTF0Stafford, KS4.950
June 136:44 PM CDTF1Marshall, IA14.040$150,000
June 137:45 PM EDTF0Lee, FL2.50
June 137:37 PM CDTF0Tama, IA0.220$10,000
June 138:46 PM CDTF0Hemphill, TX0.120
June 1311:56 PM CDTF0Woodward, OK0.320$3,000

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.