F0 tornado, Cherry Hill, New Jersey, September 28, 2004

1. F040 to 72 mphthis tornado

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

2. F173 to 112 mph

   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.

Rating

F0

Date

September 28, 2004

Touchdown

3:30 PM EDT (19:30 UTC)

Path length

2.5 miles (4.0 km)

Path width

17 yards (16 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$100,000

County

Camden County

Touchdown point

39.920, -75.020

Lift-off point

39.920, -75.020

Record number

617

A confirmed F0 (Fujita Scale) tornado touched down in Cherry Hill with maximum winds estimated at 70 mph winds. The path length was 2.5 miles long, with a maximum path width of 50 feet. The northern part of the path was intermittent. Damage included the downing of some trees and power poles, vehicles damaged by flying debris and roof damage to at least two stores. In all the tornado damaged thirteen buildings. The worst damage was concentrated in the shopping center containing the Super G Supermarket on Brace Road. The tornadic winds flung kiosks across the shopping center parking lot. A heating and ventilation system was ripped from the roof of two buildings and caused a gas leak. The winds also pushed the nonbearing wall separating two businesses by as much as one foot. A number of vehicles in the parking lot had dents and broken windows. The Silver Court Nursing Home also suffered damage but no serious injuries were reported along the entire length of the tornado.

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

No tornado warning for this county appears in the archive as in force at the moment the tornado touched down.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 16:26 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 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.

The Philadelphia radar (KDIX), 52 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 19:30 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2004 tornado in New JerseyEvery tornado in New Jersey since 1950Warnings in force in New Jersey nowThe forecast where you are

3 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.