EF0 tornado, Delphos, Iowa, June 25, 2018

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

June 25, 2018

Touchdown

5:14 PM CDT (22:14 UTC)

Lifted

5:16 PM CDT (22:16 UTC)

On the ground

2 minutes

Path length

0.7 miles (1.2 km)

Path width

40 yards (37 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Ringgold County

Touchdown point

40.662, -94.338

Lift-off point

40.672, -94.337

Record number

1806251614-01

An occluded/occluding surface low pressure system slowly worked its way into western and southwest Iowa during the morning and afternoon of the 25th. Given its location, Iowa was situated north of the warm front, which was much further south into central Missouri. Even so, the environment was cool yet fairly saturated in the low levels with temperatures in the low to mid 70s and dew points in the mid to upper 60s. ||Low level flow was up over the occluded front, providing additional lift, within an environment of around 1000 J/kg MUCAPE, effective shear up to around 40 kts, lifted condensation levels approaching 500 m at times, and plenty of low level 0-1 km storm relative helicity in excess of 200-300 m2/s2. All in all, it was a ripe day for general moderate to heavy rainfall, funnel clouds, and weak landspout tornadoes. The majority of the action revolved around heavy rainfall that totaled in excess of 3 inches in many locations, but also involved multiple funnel cloud reports and a lone brief tornado near Delphos in Ringgold County.

This tornado touched down in the hamlet of Delphos with tree debris being tossed around. A rather diffuse funnel for much of its existence, very little damage occurred with this tornado. The event was captured on video by a few different storm chasers.

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

18 minutes of warning. NWS DMX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:56 UTC, 18 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:30 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 Slight Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:49 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.

Lamoni (LWD), 37 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Des Moines radar (KDMX), 129 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:11 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 2018 tornado in IowaEvery tornado in Iowa since 1950Warnings in force in Iowa nowThe forecast where you are

2 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.