Tornadoes · United States · Massachusetts · 1983

F0 tornado, Franklin County, Massachusetts, August 1, 1983

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Franklin County on August 1, 1983, touching down at 3:00 PM EDT and reaching 13 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did under $50 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
August 1, 1983
Touchdown
3:00 PM EDT (19:00 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
13 yards (12 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
under $50
County
Franklin County
Touchdown point
42.600, -72.600
Record number
718

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.

Albany, NY (KALB), 12:00Z

7.0 hours before the tornado, 101 km from the path. August 1, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Albany, NY at 12:00Z on 1983-08-01Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 207 joules per kilogram, CIN -174, lifted condensation level 1048 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, Albany, NY at 12:00Z on 1983-08-01The 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 157 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 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
207 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-174 J/kg
Surface CAPE
775 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1048 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
157 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
163 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.6
0-3 km lapse rate
5.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Albany, NY (KALB), 00:00Z

5.0 hours after it, 101 km from the path. August 2, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Albany, NY at 00:00Z on 1983-08-02Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 733 joules per kilogram, CIN -43, lifted condensation level 861 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, Albany, NY at 00:00Z on 1983-08-02The 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 61 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 39 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
733 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-43 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1358 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
861 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
39 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
61 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
110 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.2
Supercell composite
2.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Keene/Dillant(Awos) (EEN), 43 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
17:00 UTC9232150° 15 kt1016.6
19:00 UTC9132160° 12 kt1015.2
20:00 UTC7032110° 5 kt1017.9

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1983 tornado in MassachusettsEvery tornado in Massachusetts since 1950Warnings in force in Massachusetts nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 1, 1983

3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 111:50 AM PDTF0San Bernardino, CA0.3301$50,000 to $500,000
August 16:30 PM EDTF0Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Region, CT0.220under $50
August 18:10 PM CDTF1Livingston Parish, LA1.0200$500,000 to $5 million

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.