Tornadoes · United States · Michigan · 1976

F3 tornado, Gladwin and Ogemaw counties, Michigan, March 30, 1976

This F3 tornado ran 11.4 miles across Gladwin and Ogemaw counties on March 30, 1976, touching down at 2:10 PM EST and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 10, 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 mph

    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 mphthis tornado

    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
F3
Date
March 30, 1976
Touchdown
2:10 PM EST (19:10 UTC)
Path length
11.4 miles (18.3 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
10
Property damage
under $50
Counties
Gladwin and Ogemaw counties
Touchdown point
44.130, -84.220
Lift-off point
44.330, -84.150
Record number
217

What the Weather Service recorded

The deaths

1 direct deaths are recorded for this tornado, each with what Storm Data knows of it.

AgeSexWhereKind
Direct

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

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.

Detroit, MI (KFNT), 12:00Z

7.2 hours before the tornado, 179 km from the path. March 30, 1976.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Detroit, MI at 12:00Z on 1976-03-30Temperature 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 -11929, lifted condensation level 640 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, Detroit, MI at 12:00Z on 1976-03-30The 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 180 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-11929 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
640 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
39 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
180 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
222 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Detroit, MI (KFNT), 00:00Z

4.8 hours after it, 179 km from the path. March 31, 1976.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Detroit, MI at 00:00Z on 1976-03-31Temperature 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 -13347, lifted condensation level 1747 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, Detroit, MI at 00:00Z on 1976-03-31The 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 198 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 66 knots.1939587897117136156Sfc1 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
-13347 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1747 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
66 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
28 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
198 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
362 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
7.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Houghton Lake (HTL), 41 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
18:00 UTC5554140° 12 kt18999.3FG
18:35 UTC90° 9 kt18998
19:00 UTC514720° 6 kt16998.6TSRA FG
19:30 UTC110° 7 kt997.3
20:00 UTC5551210° 8 kt16997
21:00 UTC5042230° 13 kt21998

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1976 tornado in MichiganEvery tornado in Michigan since 1950Warnings in force in Michigan nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of March 30, 1976

18 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
March 302:32 AM CSTF1Kerr, TX1.01008$50,000 to $500,000
March 302:40 AM CSTF2Kendall, TX15.2200$500,000 to $5 million
March 303:20 AM CSTF2Hays, TX1.0100$5,000 to $50,000
March 303:30 AM CSTF2Hays, TX2.52001$50,000 to $500,000
March 303:45 AM CSTF0Travis, TX10.41008$50,000 to $500,000
March 305:00 AM CSTF1Burleson, TX6.6200$500,000 to $5 million
March 301:40 PM ESTF1Clare, MI2.067$5,000 to $50,000
March 301:00 PM CSTF2Polk, TX22.11,3001$500,000 to $5 million
March 301:20 PM CSTF2Polk, TX26.71,300$50,000 to $500,000
March 301:25 PM CSTF0Wilcox, AL0.250$5,000 to $50,000
March 302:40 PM ESTF3Ogemaw, MI6.411717$50,000 to $500,000
March 301:45 PM CSTF1Angelina, TX0.110
March 301:50 PM CSTF1Madison, MS3.0100
March 302:00 PM CSTF2Vernon Parish, LA35.950$50,000 to $500,000
March 303:05 PM ESTF1Iosco, MI2.583$5,000 to $50,000
March 303:20 PM ESTF2Alcona, MI4.9150under $50
March 302:45 PM CSTF2Vernon Parish, LA42.1773$50,000 to $500,000
March 304:35 PM CSTF3Jefferson, MS31.71,583$50,000 to $500,000

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.