Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 1993

F1 tornado, Decatur County, Kansas, June 26, 1993

This F1 tornado ran 2.0 miles across Decatur County on June 26, 1993, touching down at 3:00 PM CDT and reaching 30 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 mph

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

  2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

    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
F1
Date
June 26, 1993
Touchdown
3:00 PM CDT (20:00 UTC)
Path length
2.0 miles (3.2 km)
Path width
30 yards (27 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Decatur County
Touchdown point
39.800, -100.550
Record number
608

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.

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 12:00Z

8.0 hours before the tornado, 148 km from the path. June 26, 1993.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1993-06-26Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 825 joules per kilogram, CIN -93, lifted condensation level 1053 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, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1993-06-26The 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 43 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
825 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-93 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1053 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
43 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
108 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
81 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.9
0-3 km lapse rate
3.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 00:00Z

4.0 hours after it, 148 km from the path. June 27, 1993.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1993-06-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2851 joules per kilogram, CIN -13, lifted condensation level 1404 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, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1993-06-27The 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 27 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 47 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
2851 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-13 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3057 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1404 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
47 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
14 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
27 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
92 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.6
Supercell composite
4.4
0-3 km lapse rate
8.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Oberlin (OIN), 4 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
00:00 UTC

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1993 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 26, 1993

12 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 262:20 PM CDTF0Decatur, KS0.220
June 262:50 PM CDTF0Valley, NE0.550
June 263:31 PM CDTF0Brazoria, TX0.110
June 263:50 PM CDTF1Howard, NE1.073
June 264:20 PM CDTF1Custer, NE2.023$50 to $500
June 265:00 PM CDTF0Decatur, KS0.220
June 265:05 PM CDTF1Sherman, NE0.550
June 265:35 PM CDTF0McHenry, IL0.220$5,000 to $50,000
June 265:38 PM CDTF0Walworth, WI5.073$5,000 to $50,000
June 265:55 PM CDTF0Lafayette, WI0.123
June 266:05 PM CDTF0Kenosha, WI1.550$500 to $5,000
June 2611:07 PM CDTF1Finney, KS10.030$50,000 to $500,000

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.