Tornadoes · United States · Nebraska · 1987

F1 tornado, Deuel County, Nebraska, June 8, 1987

This F1 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Deuel County on June 8, 1987, touching down at 3:00 PM MDT and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody, 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 mphthis tornado

    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 mph

    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
F1
Date
June 8, 1987
Touchdown
3:00 PM MDT (21:00 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
under $50
County
Deuel County
Touchdown point
41.220, -102.320
Record number
240

The warnings

2 minutes of warning. NWS CYS issued a tornado warning for this county at 20:58 UTC, 2 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
20:44 UTC21:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningCYS
20:58 UTC21:30 UTCTornado WarningCYS

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 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.

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 12:00Z

9.0 hours before the tornado, 144 km from the path. June 8, 1987.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1987-06-08Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 735 joules per kilogram, CIN -112, lifted condensation level 1020 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 12:00Z on 1987-06-08The 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 58 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 23 knots.1939Sfc1 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
735 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-112 J/kg
Surface CAPE
7 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1020 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
23 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
58 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
11 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.6
0-3 km lapse rate
5.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE (KLBF), 00:00Z

3.0 hours after it, 144 km from the path. June 9, 1987.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1987-06-09Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 183 joules per kilogram, CIN -110, lifted condensation level 1140 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, N. Platte/Lee Bi, NE at 00:00Z on 1987-06-09The 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 -29 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 21 knots.1939Sfc1 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
183 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-110 J/kg
Surface CAPE
114 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1140 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-29 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
115 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1987 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are

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.