Tornadoes · United States · New York · 2004

F0 tornado, Chippewa Bay, New York, June 9, 2004

This F0 tornado ran 2.0 miles across St. Lawrence County on June 9, 2004, touching down at 4:15 PM EDT and reaching 350 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $30,000 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.

  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.

The record

Rating
F0
Date
June 9, 2004
Touchdown
4:15 PM EDT (20:15 UTC)
Path length
2.0 miles (3.2 km)
Path width
350 yards (320 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$30,000
County
St. Lawrence County
Touchdown point
44.450, -75.750
Lift-off point
44.430, -75.720
Record number
1330

What the Weather Service recorded

A low pressure system moved across southern Quebec during Wednesday, June 9th. The associated trailing cold front tracked slowly across northern New York during the morning and afternoon hours. This front was preceded and accompanied by thunderstorms with damaging winds and weak tornadoes. A weak F0 tornado touched down near Chippewa Bay and moved southeast. About 50 trees were damaged. There was some structural damage, and the roof of a small structure was dropped in the St Lawrence River.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
18:42 UTC19:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningBTV
19:53 UTC21:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningBTV
20:27 UTC21:00 UTCTornado WarningBTV
21:20 UTC22:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningBTV

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 20:13 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.

Albany, NY (KALY), 12:00Z

8.3 hours before the tornado, 248 km from the path. June 9, 2004.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Albany, NY at 12:00Z on 2004-06-09Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 192 joules per kilogram, CIN -182, lifted condensation level 1000 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 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, Albany, NY at 12:00Z on 2004-06-09The 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 117 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 32 knots.193958Sfc1 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
192 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-182 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1000 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
34 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
117 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
4.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
20:45 UTCTORNADORichvilleSt. Lawrence, NYTORNADO HIT A HOUSE
21:37 UTCTSTM WND DMGCarthageJefferson, NYPOWER LINES BLOWN DOWN

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

This ground now

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

The other tornadoes of June 9, 2004

9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 911:40 AM PDTF0Jefferson, OR0.520$1,000
June 94:40 PM EDTF0St. Lawrence, NY0.2100$30,000
June 94:15 PM MDTF0Adams, CO0.150
June 94:35 PM MDTF0Adams, CO0.150
June 95:35 PM CDTF0Cleveland, OK0.320$10,000
June 95:16 PM MDTF0Adams, CO0.150
June 96:24 PM CDTF1Lincoln, OK4.050$150,000
June 96:53 PM CDTF1Lincoln, OK2.030$200,000
June 97:11 PM MDTF1Logan, CO0.5752$1.9 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.