Tornadoes · United States · Nebraska · 2011

EF0 tornado, Bushnell, Nebraska, August 10, 2011

This EF0 tornado ran 1.1 miles across Kimball County on August 10, 2011, touching down at 4:00 PM MDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody.

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.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. 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.

  4. 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.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. 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.

  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
EF0
Date
August 10, 2011
Touchdown
4:00 PM MDT (22:00 UTC)
Lifted
4:05 PM MDT (22:05 UTC)
On the ground
5 minutes
Path length
1.1 miles (1.8 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Kimball County
Touchdown point
41.209, -103.873
Lift-off point
41.200, -103.855
Record number
1108101600-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A late afternoon thunderstorm spawned an EF0 tornado just southeast of Bushnell in Kimball County.

An EF0 tornado touched down a few miles southeast of Bushnell between County Roads 20 and 30. No damage was reported.

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

The warnings

22 minutes of warning. NWS CYS issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:38 UTC, 22 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:15 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:31 UTC22:19 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningCYS
21:38 UTC22:15 UTCTornado WarningCYS
22:08 UTC01:49 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WatchCYS
22:11 UTC23:00 UTCTornado WarningCYS
00:10 UTC00:34 UTCSevere Thunderstorm 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 forecast that day

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:56 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.

Denver, CO (KDNR), 12:00Z

10.0 hours before the tornado, 158 km from the path. August 10, 2011.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Denver, CO at 12:00Z on 2011-08-10Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 463 joules per kilogram, CIN -286, lifted condensation level 728 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km-30°-20°-10°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, Denver, CO at 12:00Z on 2011-08-10The 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 59 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 54 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
463 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-286 J/kg
Surface CAPE
451 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
728 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
54 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
59 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
109 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Denver, CO (KDNR), 00:00Z

2.0 hours after it, 158 km from the path. August 11, 2011.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Denver, CO at 00:00Z on 2011-08-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 87 joules per kilogram, CIN -81, lifted condensation level 3466 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km-30°-20°-10°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, Denver, CO at 00:00Z on 2011-08-11The 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 42 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 61 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
87 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-81 J/kg
Surface CAPE
626 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
3466 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
61 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
42 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
149 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
-0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
9.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Cheyenne radar (KCYS), 79 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:00 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)ReportWhereCountyRemark
22:00 UTCTORNADO2 Se BushnellKimball, NEON THE GROUND BETWEEN COUNTY ROAD 20 AND 30.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2011 tornado in NebraskaEvery tornado in Nebraska since 1950Warnings in force in Nebraska nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 10, 2011

1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 103:32 AM CDTEF2Mayes, OK5.040012

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.