Tornadoes · United States · Maryland · 2003

F0 tornado, La Plata, Maryland, March 29, 2003

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Charles County on March 29, 2003, touching down at 6:35 PM EST and reaching 30 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
March 29, 2003
Touchdown
6:35 PM EST (23:35 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
30 yards (27 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Charles County
Touchdown point
38.530, -76.930
Lift-off point
38.530, -76.930
Record number
710

What the Weather Service recorded

A severe thunderstorm pushed across the Potomac River from Stafford County, Virginia into Charles County around Nanjemoy about 6 PM. A funnel cloud dropped from the storm over Nanjemoy and was spotted again several times as the storm moved toward La Plata. The funnel touched down briefly about 2 miles southwest of La Plata and again about 3 miles east of town. A few trees were downed at the site of the first touchdown. The second touchdown near Hawkins Gate Road resulted in little if any damage. When the storm was passing directly over La Plata it produced penny sized hail. A police officer took a photograph of a wall cloud over Town Hall as the storm moved through.

A tornado briefly touched down just southwest of La Plata.

A tornado briefly touched down just east of La Plata near Hawkins Gate Road.

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

The warnings

43 minutes of warning. NWS LWX issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:52 UTC, 43 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:45 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
22:52 UTC23:45 UTCTornado WarningLWX
23:42 UTC00:15 UTCTornado WarningLWX

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 20:05 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.

Washington/Dulle, VA (KIAD), 12:00Z

11.6 hours before the tornado, 62 km from the path. March 29, 2003.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Washington/Dulle, VA at 12:00Z on 2003-03-29Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1 joules per kilogram, CIN -71, lifted condensation level 529 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, Washington/Dulle, VA at 12:00Z on 2003-03-29The 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 278 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 48 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
1 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-71 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
529 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
48 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
37 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
278 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
284 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Washington/Dulle, VA (KIAD), 00:00Z

0.4 hours after it, 62 km from the path. March 30, 2003.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Washington/Dulle, VA at 00:00Z on 2003-03-30Temperature 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 -75475, lifted condensation level 1146 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, Washington/Dulle, VA at 00:00Z on 2003-03-30The 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 -204 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 61 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-75475 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1146 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
61 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
19 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-204 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
82 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
2.1
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Fort Belvoir/Daviso (DAA), 30 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
00:03 UTC360° 8 kt1012.5-SHRA
00:21 UTC5951.8350° 12 kt201013.2-TSRA
00:33 UTC5951.8350° 7 kt1013.9TSRA
00:55 UTC57.251.8360° 7 kt1014.9
01:25 UTC55.453.6360° 7 kt141014.2

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2003 tornado in MarylandEvery tornado in Maryland since 1950Warnings in force in Maryland nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of March 29, 2003

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
March 296:25 PM ESTF0Charles, MD0.130

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.