Tornadoes · United States · Michigan · 2006
F0 tornado, Beebe to Breckenridge, Michigan, May 25, 2006
From Beebe to Breckenridge, this F0 tornado ran 3.0 miles across Gratiot County on May 25, 2006, touching down at 8:43 PM EDT and reaching 33 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.
F040 to 72 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
F4207 to 260 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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 25, 2006
- Touchdown
- 8:43 PM EDT (00:43 UTC)
- Path length
- 3.0 miles (4.8 km)
- Path width
- 33 yards (30 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Gratiot County
- Touchdown point
- 43.330, -84.550
- Lift-off point
- 43.400, -84.480
- Record number
- 567
What the Weather Service recorded
This F0 tornado produced no damage along it's path and eyewitnesses saw a dust cloud near the base of the tornado.
This F0 also resulted in no damage along it's path near Breckenridge.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
2 minutes of warning. NWS GRR issued a tornado warning for this county at 00:41 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 01:15 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19:15 UTC | 22:41 UTC | Tornado Watch | GRR |
| 00:41 UTC | 01:15 UTC | Tornado Warning | GRR |
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 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:06 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.
Detroit, MI (KDTX), 12:00Z
11.3 hours after it, 114 km from the path. May 26, 2006.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 86 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -16 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 71 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 614 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 16 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 9 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 27 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 25 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.4 K/km
The radar
The Grand Rapids radar (KGRR), 99 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:41 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.
What was reported nearby
Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22:30 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 6 W Perry | Shiawassee, MI | TREE DOWN |
| 00:40 UTC | TORNADO | Beebe | Gratiot, MI | WEAK TORNADO OBSERVED LOFTING DUST INTO THE AIR NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF TYLER ROAD AND BALDWIN ROAD. |
| 00:43 UTC | TORNADO | Beebe | Gratiot, MI | WEAK TORNADO OBSERVED LOFTING DUST INTO THE AIR NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF TYLER ROAD AND BALDWIN ROAD. |
| 00:45 UTC | TORNADO | 2 Ssw Breckenridge | Gratiot, MI | WEAK TORNADO OBSERVED NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF LINCOLN ROAD AND WISNER ROAD. TORNADO LIFTED NEAR HERE. |
| 00:50 UTC | TORNADO | 2 Ssw Breckenridge | Gratiot, MI | WEAK TORNADO OBSERVED NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF LINCOLN ROAD AND WISNER ROAD. TORNADO LIFTED NEAR HERE. |
| 01:00 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 4 Nne Breckenridge | Gratiot, MI | FUNNEL CLOUD OBSERVED BY POLICE EXITING GRATIOT COUNTY. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2006 tornado in MichiganEvery tornado in Michigan since 1950Warnings in force in Michigan nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of May 25, 2006
3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
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.