Tornadoes · United States · Kentucky · 2005

F0 tornado, Pine Ridge, Kentucky, May 19, 2005

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Wolfe County on May 19, 2005, touching down at 10:00 PM EDT and reaching 80 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $20,000 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 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 19, 2005
Touchdown
10:00 PM EDT (02:00 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
80 yards (73 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$20,000
County
Wolfe County
Touchdown point
37.750, -83.580
Lift-off point
37.750, -83.580
Record number
94

What the Weather Service recorded

A brief F0 tornado touched down along Campbells Ridge Road. The tornado had a width of 80 yards and a length of 150 yards. This tornado downed several trees and caused damage to three structures. A mobile home was shifted, and one home sustained some roof damage.

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.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:23 UTC22:03 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningJKL
01:51 UTC02:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningJKL
02:31 UTC03:00 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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 01:02 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.

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 00:00Z

2.0 hours before the tornado, 188 km from the path. May 20, 2005.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2005-05-20Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 608 joules per kilogram, CIN -84, lifted condensation level 800 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2005-05-20The 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 297 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 24 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
608 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-84 J/kg
Surface CAPE
196 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
800 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
24 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
30 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
297 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
537 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.6
Supercell composite
5.4
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 12:00Z

10.0 hours after it, 188 km from the path. May 20, 2005.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2005-05-20Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 114 joules per kilogram, CIN -27, lifted condensation level 521 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2005-05-20The 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 18 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 13 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
114 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-27 J/kg
Surface CAPE
73 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
521 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
4 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
18 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
55 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Jackson,KY radar (KJKL), 29 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:57 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 2005 tornado in KentuckyEvery tornado in Kentucky since 1950Warnings in force in Kentucky nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 19, 2005

4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 193:15 PM EDTF1Scioto, OH2.050$20,000
May 197:28 PM CDTF1Christian, KY0.250$10,000
May 197:38 PM CDTF1Todd, KY0.2100$250,000
May 191:25 AM EDTF1Smyth, VA0.650

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.