Tornadoes · United States · Kentucky · 2000
F3 tornado, Leitchfield, Kentucky, May 23, 2000
This F3 tornado ran 6.0 miles across Grayson County on May 23, 2000, touching down at 2:00 PM CDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 16, and did $50 million 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.
F040 to 72 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
F3158 to 206 mphthis tornado
Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- F3
- Date
- May 23, 2000
- Touchdown
- 2:00 PM CDT (19:00 UTC)
- Path length
- 6.0 miles (9.7 km)
- Path width
- 100 yards (91 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 16
- Property damage
- $50 million
- County
- Grayson County
- Touchdown point
- 37.530, -86.300
- Lift-off point
- 37.480, -86.230
- Record number
- 920
What the Weather Service recorded
A storm survey was done by NWS personnel on Wednesday May 24. The survey found severe damage to residential and industrial structures. Three vortices combined into a single tornado north of Leitchfield, then moved east to southeast at 40 to 45 mph. The path moved through the northeast and east sections of Leitchfield and beyond. (Path length and width are estimated). The structural damaged evidenced the presence of an F3 tornado, with maximum winds around 175 mph. Houses that were virtually destroyed, but still had parts of their structure remaining above the main floor, were the basis of the F3 evaluation. Severe damage to nearby factories also supported the F3 evaluation.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
23 minutes of warning. NWS LMK issued a tornado warning for this county at 18:37 UTC, 23 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 19:05 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 15:07 UTC | 15:50 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | LMK |
| 18:37 UTC | 19:05 UTC | Tornado Warning | LMK |
| 19:03 UTC | 19:35 UTC | Tornado Warning | LMK |
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. The outlook in force was issued at 16:01 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.
Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 12:00Z
7.0 hours before the tornado, 156 km from the path. May 23, 2000.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 25 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -194 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 89 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1129 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 38 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 232 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 311 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.4
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.1 K/km
Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 00:00Z
5.0 hours after it, 156 km from the path. May 24, 2000.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1386 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -16 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 908 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1168 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 40 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 15 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 102 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 216 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.9
- Supercell composite
- 6.9
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 6.5 K/km
The surface observations
Fort Knox/Godman (FTK), 52 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 17:55 UTC | 69.8 | 66.2 | 200° 6 kt | 1003.4 | -TSRA | |
| 18:07 UTC | 69.8 | 66.2 | 200° 6 kt | 1003.4 | -TSRA | |
| 18:24 UTC | 69.8 | 68 | 180° 8 kt | 1003 | -TSRA | |
| 18:55 UTC | 71.6 | 69.8 | 200° 6 kt | 1003 | -TSRA | |
| 19:31 UTC | 69.8 | 69.8 | 80° 3 kt | 1002.4 | -TSRA | |
| 19:41 UTC | 68 | 66.2 | 350° 21 kt | 29 | 1004.4 | +TSRAGR |
| 19:49 UTC | 66.2 | 64.4 | 320° 13 kt | 32 | 1003.4 | +TSRA BR |
| 19:55 UTC | 66.2 | 66.2 | 250° 9 kt | 32 | 1002.7 | TSRA BR |
| 20:04 UTC | 66.2 | 66.2 | 330° 5 kt | 1002.7 | -TSRA | |
| 20:46 UTC | 66.2 | 66.2 | 260° 3 kt | 1003 | ||
| 20:55 UTC | 68 | 66.2 | 120° 3 kt | 1002.7 |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Louisville radar (KLVX), 59 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 18:57 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.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2000 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 23, 2000
16 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 23 | 2:25 PM CDT | F0 | Hart, KY | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| May 23 | 4:40 PM EDT | F2 | Harrison, OH | 3.0 | 200 | $100,000 | ||
| May 23 | 5:05 PM EDT | F1 | Knox, TN | 0.5 | 40 | 1 | ||
| May 23 | 5:06 PM EDT | F0 | Jefferson, OH | 2.0 | 50 | $10,000 | ||
| May 23 | 5:20 PM EDT | F0 | Taylor, KY | 0.1 | 20 | $10,000 | ||
| May 23 | 6:00 PM EDT | F0 | Fairfield, OH | 0.5 | 130 | $50,000 | ||
| May 23 | 6:10 PM EDT | F1 | Perry, OH | 2.0 | 150 | $180,000 | ||
| May 23 | 6:30 PM EDT | F2 | Marion, OH | 3.0 | 200 | $200,000 | ||
| May 23 | 6:15 PM CDT | F0 | Calloway, KY | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| May 23 | 6:30 PM CDT | F1 | Calloway, KY | 1.5 | 100 | $50,000 | ||
| May 23 | 7:43 PM EDT | F1 | Tyler, WV | 1.0 | 70 | $90,000 | ||
| May 23 | 7:04 PM CDT | F0 | Calloway, KY | 0.2 | 20 | $4,000 | ||
| May 23 | 8:15 PM EDT | F1 | Washington, OH | 1.0 | 100 | $150,000 | ||
| May 23 | 7:25 PM CDT | F1 | Stewart, TN | 0.2 | 20 | |||
| May 23 | 7:48 PM CDT | F0 | Bollinger, MO | 0.3 | 20 | |||
| May 23 | 9:04 PM CDT | F0 | Scott, MO | 0.2 | 30 |
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.