Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 1990

F0 tornado, Rush County, Kansas, May 24, 1990

This F0 tornado ran 18.0 miles across Rush County on May 24, 1990, touching down at 5:00 PM CDT and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $5,000 to $50,000 of property damage.

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
May 24, 1990
Touchdown
5:00 PM CDT (22:00 UTC)
Path length
18.0 miles (29.0 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Rush County
Touchdown point
38.380, -99.180
Lift-off point
38.450, -99.070
Record number
423

The warnings

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:39 UTC22:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningGLD

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:37 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.

Dodge City, (KDDC), 12:00Z

10.0 hours before the tornado, 99 km from the path. May 24, 1990.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1990-05-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN 0, lifted condensation level NaN meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1990-05-24The 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 279 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
0 J/kg
Surface CAPE
10 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
NaN m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
279 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
286 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Dodge City, (KDDC), 00:00Z

2.0 hours after it, 99 km from the path. May 25, 1990.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1990-05-25Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 558 joules per kilogram, CIN -7, lifted condensation level 3699 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 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, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1990-05-25The 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 16 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 39 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
558 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-7 J/kg
Surface CAPE
519 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3699 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
39 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
6 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
16 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
63 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.3
0-3 km lapse rate
9.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1990 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 24, 1990

23 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 243:00 PM MDTF1Carbon, MT0.210
May 243:10 PM MDTF0Platte, WY0.140
May 243:45 PM MDTF1Laramie, WY0.550
May 243:55 PM MDTF1Laramie, WY1.050
May 244:00 PM MDTF1Yellowstone, MT0.210
May 245:03 PM CDTF0Barton, KS5.010
May 244:05 PM MDTF1Goshen, WY1.050
May 244:10 PM MDTF1Laramie, WY1.050
May 245:10 PM CDTF3Barton, KS26.01,3206$50,000 to $500,000
May 245:50 PM CDTF3Rice, KS60.0400$500,000 to $5 million
May 245:17 PM MDTF0Meade, SD0.520
May 245:35 PM MDTF1Campbell, WY2.0100$500 to $5,000
May 245:45 PM MDTF1Laramie, WY0.550
May 245:50 PM MDTF0Campbell, WY0.540
May 245:55 PM MDTF2Laramie, WY5.0400$500 to $5,000
May 246:10 PM MDTF1Laramie, WY1.0150$500 to $5,000
May 246:33 PM MDTF1Powder River, MT0.210
May 246:36 PM MDTF0Campbell, WY1.050$500 to $5,000
May 246:55 PM MDTF0Laramie, WY0.240
May 246:58 PM MDTF0Laramie, WY0.340
May 247:10 PM MDTF0Laramie, WY0.340
May 247:15 PM MDTF0Laramie, WY0.340
May 247:30 PM MDTF0Laramie, WY0.340

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.