F0 tornado, Millersburg to North English, Iowa, May 18, 2000

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.

Rating

F0

Date

May 18, 2000

Touchdown

2:12 PM CDT (19:12 UTC)

Path length

0.1 miles (0.2 km)

Path width

10 yards (9 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Iowa County

Touchdown point

41.600, -92.200

Lift-off point

41.600, -92.200

Record number

853

The same frontal boundary meandering about Southern Iowa and Central Illinois lifted into Central Iowa and North Central Illinois by afternoon. A nearly stacked low center over the Mid Missouri River Valley underwent filling as it shifted eastward across Southern Iowa and Central Illinois. Much of Eastern Iowa along and south of U.S. Highway 30 was thrusted into the warm sector where temperatures climbed into the upper 70s to lower 80s. Meanwhile, areas north of the boundary were quite cool with a brisk northeast surface wind and plenty of cloud cover keeping temperatures down in the 60s. 12z soundings from KILX and KDVN indicated very steep lapse rates with Cape values of 2000-3000 J-kg. Thunderstorms quickly erupted along the boundary from Central Iowa through Northeast Iowa into Northern Illinois by late morning, and continued through the afternoon producing a few reports of large hail and torrential rain. Further south, a few supercells developed near Ottumwa. These supercells moved east into Washington...Jefferson and Iowa Counties producing large hail, high winds and a couple of brief, weak tornadoes in Iowa County. An F0 tornado touched down 3 miles northwest of Millersburg while another touched down several minutes later just west of North English. Both tornadoes were short lived and produced no damage. All auto dealerships in the city of Washington reported that nearly every car on their outside lots was damaged by the hail, which was as large as golfballs. Many homes suffered hail damage to siding, roofs and windows. The hail covered the ground in spots and was reported to have drifted as high as a foot up against the sides of some buildings in town. Damage to corn crops was minimal, while soybean crops were not as lucky, as many suffered extensive damage. Many acres had to be replanted. High winds were responsible for blowing a house trailer onto it's side while being transported north of Washington on Riverside Road. The supercell over Jefferson County weakened, while the Washington County supercell tracked northeast into Muscatine County producing golfball size hail, torrential rain, high winds and a few funnel clouds. Hail damaged several cars in Muscatine. High winds caved the roof in on a barn 6 miles west of Muscatine and scattered pieces of the wood structure across the farmland. The supercell then gradually weakened as it moved into the Quad Cities, but still managed to produce penny to golfball sized hail and high winds in Central and Western Scott County. Torrential rainfall on the order of 2 to 3 inches an hour led to localized street flooding throughout the Quad Cities and surrounding areas. When the storms hit the Quad Cities the temperature at the Davenport Municipal Airport plummeted from 83 to 55 degrees.

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 Moderate Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 16:25 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 Des Moines radar (KDMX), 127 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 19:10 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.

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

36 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.