Tornadoes · United States · Kansas · 2015

EF0 tornado, Sharon, Kansas, April 12, 2015

This EF0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Barber County on April 12, 2015, touching down at 8:18 PM CDT and reaching 75 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  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.

The record

Rating
EF0
Date
April 12, 2015
Touchdown
8:18 PM CDT (01:18 UTC)
Lifted
8:20 PM CDT (01:20 UTC)
On the ground
2 minutes
Path length
0.5 miles (0.8 km)
Path width
75 yards (69 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Barber County
Touchdown point
37.372, -98.418
Lift-off point
37.376, -98.410
Record number
1504121918-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A cold front advanced across the area during the afternoon and evening. There were also residual outflow boundaries from convection the day before that provided a focusing area for thunderstorm development.

This was a brief and weak tornado.

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

The warnings

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.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 22:20 UTC and running to 04:00 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
22:20 UTC04:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WatchDDC
00:02 UTC01:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningDDC
00:57 UTC01:39 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningDDC
01:20 UTC01:30 UTCTornado WarningDDC
03:29 UTC03:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningDDC

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 Slight Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:00 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), 00:00Z

1.3 hours before the tornado, 138 km from the path. April 13, 2015.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 00:00Z on 2015-04-13Temperature 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 -97428, lifted condensation level 3762 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 00:00Z on 2015-04-13The 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 16 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 49 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-97428 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3762 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
49 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
16 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
71 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
9.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Dodge City, (KDDC), 12:00Z

10.7 hours after it, 138 km from the path. April 13, 2015.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Dodge City, at 12:00Z on 2015-04-13Temperature 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 -105193, lifted condensation level 2101 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 2015-04-13The 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 -151 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 33 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-105193 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
2101 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
33 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-151 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-171 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Medicine_lodge (P28), 16 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
23:56 UTC7761170° 9 kt141006.4
00:56 UTC7462310° 11 kt191007.5
01:56 UTC656290° 5 kt1006.8
02:56 UTC585620° 8 kt241008.8

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

The radar

The Vance AFB radar (KVNX), 75 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:17 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.

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
00:36 UTCTSTM WND GST 60SawyerPratt, KS
01:00 UTCTSTM WND GST 503 S IsabelBarber, KSTHERE WAS ALSO PEA SIZE HAIL.
01:10 UTCTSTM WND DMG4 Se IsabelBarber, KSLOST WELL TOP OFF A WELL. IT WAS MADE OF BOARD AND TIN AND WEIGHED AROUND 70 POUNDS. THERE WAS ALSO DIME SIZE HAIL.
01:18 UTCTORNADO8 N SharonBarber, KSTHE TORNADO WAS SEEN TO THE EAST FROM HIGH 281 NEAR RESORT ROAD 5 MILES NORTH OF MEDICINE LODGE.
01:18 UTCTORNADO8 N SharonBarber, KSTHE TORNADO WAS SEEN TO THE EAST FROM HIGHWAY 281 NEAR RESORT ROAD 5 MILES NORTH OF MEDICINE LODGE.
01:23 UTCHAIL 0.752 Nne Medicine LodgeBarber, KS
01:56 UTCHEAVY RAIN 13 N ZendaKingman, KSTRAINED SPOTTER REPORTS ONE INCH OF RAIN IN 45 MINUTES.
03:30 UTCTSTM WND DMGKiowaBarber, KSONE INCH DIAMETER TREE LIMBS WERE DOWNED.
03:30 UTCTSTM WND GST 60KiowaBarber, KSTHERE WAS ALSO PEA SIZE HAIL.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2015 tornado in KansasEvery tornado in Kansas since 1950Warnings in force in Kansas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 12, 2015

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 126:46 PM CDTEF0Smith, KS1.120$20,000

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.