Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 1995

F0 tornado, Codell to Plainville, Kansas, May 12, 1995

From Codell to Plainville, this F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Rooks County on May 12, 1995, touching down at 6:45 PM CDT and reaching 23 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
May 12, 1995
Touchdown
6:45 PM CDT (23:45 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
23 yards (21 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Rooks County
Touchdown point
39.200, -99.300
Record number
344

The warnings

9 minutes of warning. NWS GID issued a tornado warning for this county at 23:36 UTC, 9 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 00:15 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
22:12 UTC23:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningGID
22:43 UTC23:30 UTCTornado WarningGID
23:36 UTC00:15 UTCTornado WarningGID

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 High Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 05:46 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

11.8 hours before the tornado, 167 km from the path. May 12, 1995.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1995-05-12Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 49 joules per kilogram, CIN -435, lifted condensation level 661 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, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 1995-05-12The 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 333 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
49 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-435 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
661 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
39 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
333 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
424 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.3
0-3 km lapse rate
3.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Dodge City, (KDDC), 00:00Z

0.2 hours after it, 167 km from the path. May 13, 1995.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1995-05-13Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 22 joules per kilogram, CIN -58, lifted condensation level 3259 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, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 1995-05-13The 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 99 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 60 knots.1939587897117136Sfc1 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
22 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-58 J/kg
Surface CAPE
28 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3259 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
60 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
99 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
153 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
9.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Hays_muni (HYS), 40 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
22:00 UTC7661140° 24 kt29989.5
23:00 UTC74.8461.88160° 19 kt30988.1
00:00 UTC72.8656180° 9 kt988.5
01:00 UTC685860° 10 kt16990.2

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1995 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 12, 1995

12 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 121:00 PM CDTF1St. Mary Parish, LA0.5231
May 123:12 PM CDTF0Thomas, KS0.150
May 123:15 PM CDTF2Thomas, KS18.01,5001$500,000 to $5 million
May 125:35 PM EDTF0Gilchrist, FL5.010$5,000 to $50,000
May 124:45 PM CDTF2Sheridan, KS0.8200
May 124:50 PM CDTF1Graham, KS0.250
May 126:20 PM CDTF0Ellis, KS0.150
May 126:24 PM CDTF0Rooks, KS0.123
May 127:18 PM CDTF1Russell, KS4.050
May 127:30 PM CDTF1Lincoln, KS1.050
May 127:50 PM MDTF0Douglas, CO0.250
May 129:01 PM CDTF0Ottawa, KS3.080

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.