EF0 tornado, Marstons Mills Arpt to West Barnstable, Massachusetts, August 8, 2023

1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. EF186 to 110 mph

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 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. EF3136 to 165 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. EF4166 to 200 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. EF5over 200 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.

Rating

EF0

Date

August 8, 2023

Touchdown

11:52 AM EDT (15:52 UTC)

Lifted

11:56 AM EDT (15:56 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

1.2 miles (1.9 km)

Path width

650 yards (594 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$2,000

County

Barnstable County

Touchdown point

41.675, -70.392

Lift-off point

41.682, -70.372

Record number

2308080952-01

A trough moved from the eastern Great Lakes into the mid Atlantic then New England on Tuesday. Southern New England was in the warm sector of a weak low which provided enough instability for scattered thunderstorms Tuesday morning into early afternoon before the cold front moved through. There was an EF-1 tornado in Mattapoisett and an EF-0 tornado in Barnstable.

A small EF-0 tornado touched down in the town of Barnstable, near|the village of Marstons Mills, at 11:52 AM. The storm tracked ENE|from Evergreen Drive for approximately four minutes before |lifting over Joe Thompson Road, at approximately 11:56 AM. The |primary damage indicators were an uprooted hardwood tree and a|downed electrical pole, supplemented by strewn debris inclusive |of smaller trees, fence posts, and branches. The damage was most |concentrated near the center of the track at the intersection of |Race Lane and Osterville-West Barnstable Road. Witnesses described|a chaotic event, observing airborne fence posts and branches. Top wind speeds were estimated at 80 mph.

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Marginal Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 12:51 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 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.

The Boston radar (KBOX), 70 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 15:50 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.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2023 tornado in MassachusettsEvery tornado in Massachusetts since 1950Warnings in force in Massachusetts nowThe forecast where you are

13 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.