Tornadoes · United States · Missouri · 2006
F1 tornado, Benton, Missouri, February 16, 2006
This F1 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Scott County on February 16, 2006, touching down at 7:18 PM CST and reaching 225 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $100,000 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.
F040 to 72 mph
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
F173 to 112 mphthis tornado
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
- F1
- Date
- February 16, 2006
- Touchdown
- 7:18 PM CST (01:18 UTC)
- Path length
- 0.5 miles (0.8 km)
- Path width
- 225 yards (206 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- $100,000
- County
- Scott County
- Touchdown point
- 37.100, -89.550
- Lift-off point
- 37.120, -89.550
- Record number
- 59
What the Weather Service recorded
Several structures were damaged. A large shed was levelled. Partial roof damage occurred to another shed and a house. Several large trees were snapped or uprooted. Various objects were impaled into a house and a garage. Most of the damage occurred on Highway E. Peak winds were estimated near 110 MPH.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 23:15 UTC and running to 03:25 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 17:00 UTC | 05:02 UTC | Wind Advisory | PAH |
| 23:15 UTC | 03:25 UTC | Tornado Watch | PAH |
| 01:24 UTC | 02:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | PAH |
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 00:59 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.
Little Rock, AR (KLZK), 00:00Z
1.3 hours before the tornado, 256 km from the path. February 17, 2006.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 170 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -51 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 122 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 918 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 67 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 26 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 242 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 255 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.2
- Supercell composite
- 1.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.7 K/km
Little Rock, AR (KLZK), 12:00Z
10.7 hours after it, 256 km from the path. February 17, 2006.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -114269 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1075 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 64 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 24 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- -283 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- -59 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 0.3 K/km
The surface observations
Cape Girardeau (CGI), 13 km from the path, in the two hours either side.
| Time (UTC) | Temp (°F) | Dew point (°F) | Wind | Gust (kt) | Pressure (mb) | Weather |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23:53 UTC | 67 | 57 | 200° 24 kt | 36 | 1008.8 | |
| 00:53 UTC | 65 | 58 | 200° 22 kt | 32 | 1009.8 | -RA |
| 01:20 UTC | 62.6 | 59 | 270° 20 kt | 1011.2 | +RA BR | |
| 01:23 UTC | 60.8 | 57.2 | 290° 25 kt | 35 | 1011.9 | +RA BR |
| 01:33 UTC | 55.4 | 53.6 | 310° 20 kt | 31 | 1012.9 | RA BR |
| 01:36 UTC | 55.4 | 53.6 | 320° 16 kt | 29 | 1012.9 | RA BR |
| 01:53 UTC | 53 | 50 | 330° 17 kt | 25 | 1013.2 | -RA |
| 02:23 UTC | 46.4 | 41 | 310° 19 kt | 30 | 1014.9 | |
| 02:33 UTC | 46.4 | 39.2 | 310° 17 kt | 28 | 1016.3 | -RA |
| 02:53 UTC | 43 | 38 | 300° 20 kt | 26 | 1017.3 | -RA |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.
The radar
The Paducah radar (KPAH), 69 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 01:19 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01:15 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Benton | Scott, MO | LOCATION WAS FROM INTERSECTION OF HIGHWAY 77 AND HIGHWAY E IN BENTON. DAMAGED EXTENDED 1.7 MILES NORTHEAST ALONG HIGHWAY E AND WAS APPROXIMATELY 0.5 MILES WIDE. WINDS ESTIMATED 80 MPH. END TIME 720 PM. MINOR TO MODERATE |
| 01:18 UTC | TORNADO 1 | 1 Ne Benton | Stoddard, MO | TORNADO BEGAN 718 PM WITH END TIME 720 PM. MAXIMUM WIDTH 225 YRDS AND APPROXIMATELY 0.5 MILES LONG. SEVERAL STRUCTURES DAMAGED. LARGE SHED COMPLETELY LEVELED. PARTIAL ROOF DAMAGE. SEVERAL LARGE TREES SNAPPED OFF NEAR BAS |
| 01:28 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Benton | Scott, MO | NUMEROUS TREES DOWN. SOME BROKEN OFF HALF WAY UP. SOME UPROOTED. DAMAGE REPORTED TO ROOFS WITH SOME BLOWN OFF. SIDING DAMAGED TO SOME HOMES. DAMAGED AREA RESTRICTED TO A 2 1/2 BLOCK AREA IN COMMUNITY. |
| 01:28 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Benton | Scott, MO | SEVERAL LARGE TREES DOWN WITH WIDE SPREAD POWER OUTAGES THROUGHOUT COMMUNITY. |
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 MissouriEvery tornado in Missouri since 1950Warnings in force in Missouri nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of February 16, 2006
3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| February 16 | 4:00 PM CST | F0 | Shannon, MO | 0.2 | 100 | |||
| February 16 | 4:35 PM CST | F1 | Iroquois, IL | 0.1 | 25 | $20,000 | ||
| February 16 | 7:54 PM EST | F1 | Vigo, IN | 4.2 | 100 | $1.5 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.