Tornadoes · United States · Kentucky · 1987

F1 tornado, Lee County, Kentucky, August 27, 1987

This F1 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Lee County on August 27, 1987, touching down at 7:25 PM EDT and reaching 200 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 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
August 27, 1987
Touchdown
7:25 PM EDT (23:25 UTC)
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
200 yards (183 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Lee County
Touchdown point
37.600, -83.550
Record number
564

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
22:46 UTC23:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningJKL

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 06:29 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.

Huntington/Tri S, WV (KHTS), 12:00Z

11.4 hours before the tornado, 126 km from the path. August 27, 1987.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Huntington/Tri S, WV at 12:00Z on 1987-08-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 878 joules per kilogram, CIN -65, lifted condensation level 1100 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, Huntington/Tri S, WV at 12:00Z on 1987-08-27The 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 208 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 31 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
878 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-65 J/kg
Surface CAPE
873 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1100 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
31 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
36 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
208 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
176 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.5
Supercell composite
3.2
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Huntington/Tri S, WV (KHTS), 00:00Z

0.6 hours after it, 126 km from the path. August 28, 1987.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Huntington/Tri S, WV at 00:00Z on 1987-08-28Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 410 joules per kilogram, CIN -112, lifted condensation level 1368 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, Huntington/Tri S, WV at 00:00Z on 1987-08-28The 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 85 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 27 knots.1939Sfc1 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
410 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-112 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1382 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1368 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
27 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
85 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
102 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.1
Supercell composite
0.7
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Jackson/J. Carroll (JKL), 21 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
22:00 UTC847010° 4 kt1017.3TSRA
23:00 UTC757080° 7 kt1016.9TSRA
23:35 UTC280° 22 kt381020.7TSRA
00:00 UTC6464290° 14 kt201020.7TSRA
01:00 UTC6665180° 8 kt1020.7TSRA FG

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1987 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 27, 1987

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 2711:45 AM MDTF0Harding, NM0.210

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.