Tornadoes · United States · Michigan · 2007
EF1 tornado, Lansing, Michigan, August 24, 2007
This EF1 tornado ran 6.0 miles across Ingham County on August 24, 2007, touching down at 4:55 PM EDT and reaching 300 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $300,000 of property damage.
The rating scale
Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.
EF065 to 85 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- EF1
- Date
- August 24, 2007
- Touchdown
- 4:55 PM EDT (20:55 UTC)
- Lifted
- 5:00 PM EDT (21:00 UTC)
- On the ground
- 5 minutes
- Path length
- 6.0 miles (9.7 km)
- Path width
- 300 yards (274 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $300,000
- County
- Ingham County
- Touchdown point
- 42.687, -84.530
- Lift-off point
- 42.730, -84.491
- Record number
- 0708241455-01
What the Weather Service recorded
An EF-3 tornado struck Eaton county and resulted in five injuries but no fatalities. An EF-1 tornado struck Ingham county but did not produce any injuries or fatalities.
An EF-1 tornado struck Ingham county south and east of the city of Lansing. Maximum winds were estimated at 90 mph. The track of the tornado was six miles long and 200 to 300 yards wide. ||The first sign of damage was near the intersections of Waverly and M-99. Significant damage occurred at the Stonegate mobile home park south of M-99. Many trees were down there and some fell on mobile homes. The damage path continued northeast toward I-96 across Grovenburg Road. ||More tree damage was found on the north side of I-96 along Haag Road. The damage path continued northeast across Miller Road through neighborhoods where numerous oak trees were blown down, some onto homes.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
9 minutes of warning. NWS GRR issued a tornado warning for this county at 20:46 UTC, 9 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:30 UTC.
The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 20:27 UTC and running to 03:00 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20:27 UTC | 03:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Watch | GRR |
| 20:37 UTC | 21:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | GRR |
| 20:46 UTC | 21:30 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 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:00 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
8.9 hours before the tornado, 88 km from the path. August 24, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 26 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -262 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 963 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 22 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 28 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 3 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 16 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.1 K/km
Detroit, MI (KDTX), 00:00Z
3.1 hours after it, 88 km from the path. August 25, 2007.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 197 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -76 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 174 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 770 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 27 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 16 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -35 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 41 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- -0.0
- Supercell composite
- -0.2
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.7 K/km
The radar
The Detroit radar (KDTX), 85 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:53 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20:07 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 4 Ssw Vermontville | Eaton, MI | NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF CARLISLE AND MASON ROADS. TREES AND LIMBS DOWN. CHIMNEY BLOWN DOWN. |
| 20:25 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 2 N Charlotte | Eaton, MI | BUILDING DAMAGE NEAR COCHRAN AND M50 |
| 20:25 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 W Potterville | Eaton, MI | 2 BARNS DESTROYED AND ANOTHER HEAVILY DAMAGED. NEAR OTTO AND VERMONTVILLE. |
| 20:25 UTC | TORNADO 3 | 1 Wnw Potterville | Eaton, MI | *** 5 INJ *** 5 PEOPLE TREATED FOR INJURIES TORNADO DESTROYED ROUGHLY 15 HOMES ROOF AND HALF OF SECOND STORY ROOMS BLOW OFF OF ONE HOME PATH 6 AND ONE HALF MILES LONG AND 200 TO 300 YARDS WIDE MAXIMUM WINDS 140 MPH. |
| 20:25 UTC | TORNADO | 2 N Charlotte | Eaton, MI | BUILDING DAMAGE NEAR COCHRAN AND M50 |
| 20:25 UTC | TORNADO | 3 W Potterville | Eaton, MI | 2 BARNS DESTROYED AND ANOTHER HEAVILY DAMAGED. NEAR OTTO AND VERMONTVILLE. |
| 20:25 UTC | TORNADO | Potterville | Eaton, MI | *** 5 INJ *** 5 PEOPLE TREATED FOR INJURIES AND 2 PEOPLE HOSPITALIZED AS TORNADO DESTROYED SEVERAL HOMES NEAR POTTERVILLE. |
| 20:30 UTC | HAIL 1 | 2 Nw Potterville | Eaton, MI | NEAR OTTO AND DOAN |
| 20:45 UTC | TSTM WND GST 60 | 4 W Owosso | Shiawassee, MI | ZERO VSBY |
| 20:50 UTC | TSTM WND GST 60 | 4 W Owosso | Shiawassee, MI | ZERO VSBY |
| 20:55 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 2 E Lansing | Ingham, MI | AT DUNCKEL AND JOLLY POSSIBLE TORNADO TOUCHDOWN CAUSING TRANSFORMER DAMAGE. |
| 20:55 UTC | TORNADO 1 | 2 E Lansing | Ingham, MI | TRANSFORMER DAMAGED NEAR INTERSECTION OF DUNCKEL AND JOLLY. MAX WINDS ESTIMATED AROUND 90 MILES AND HOUR THE TRACK OF THE TORNADO WAS 6 MILES LONG AND 200 TO 300 MILES WIDE. |
| 20:55 UTC | TORNADO | 2 E Lansing | Ingham, MI | TRANSFORMER DAMAGED NEAR INTERSECTION OF DUNCKEL AND JOLLY. |
| 21:10 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Owosso | Shiawassee, MI | SEVERAL TREES AND POWER LINES DOWN |
| 21:23 UTC | TSTM WND GST 60 | 2 N Gregory | Livingston, MI | |
| 21:37 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 Sw Fenton | Livingston, MI | LARGE TREE AND POWERLINES BLOWN DOWN AT TYRON TWP |
| 21:39 UTC | TORNADO | 1 N Oak Grove | Livingston, MI | TORNADO TOUCHDOWN WITH SIGNIFICANT DAMAGE TO HOMES AND TREES IN COHOCTAH AND DEERFIELD TOWNSHIPS NORTHWEST AND NORTH OF OAK GROVE. |
| 21:39 UTC | TORNADO | Oak Grove | Livingston, MI | TORNADO TOUCHDOWN |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2007 tornado in MichiganEvery tornado in Michigan since 1950Warnings in force in Michigan nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of August 24, 2007
9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 24 | 2:50 PM CDT | EF0 | Phelps, MO | 1.0 | 75 | $10,000 | ||
| August 24 | 4:25 PM EDT | EF3 | Eaton, MI | 6.5 | 300 | 5 | $40 million | |
| August 24 | 4:15 PM CDT | EF0 | Dent, MO | 0.1 | 25 | |||
| August 24 | 5:23 PM EDT | EF0 | Shiawassee, MI | 0.3 | 50 | $50,000 | ||
| August 24 | 5:30 PM EDT | EF2 | Livingston, MI | 23.5 | 440 | 1 | $24 million | |
| August 24 | 4:31 PM CDT | EF0 | Brown, KS | 0.1 | 25 | |||
| August 24 | 4:32 PM CDT | EF0 | Atchison, KS | 0.1 | 25 | |||
| August 24 | 6:02 PM EDT | EF0 | Washtenaw, MI | 2.5 | 50 | $500,000 | ||
| August 24 | 6:16 PM EDT | EF1 | Lapeer, MI | 3.2 | 250 | $1.0 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.