Tornadoes · United States · North Carolina · 2002

F0 tornado, Belhaven, North Carolina, October 11, 2002

This F0 tornado ran 1.0 miles across Beaufort County on October 11, 2002, touching down at 6:45 PM EDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $20,000 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
October 11, 2002
Touchdown
6:45 PM EDT (22:45 UTC)
Path length
1.0 miles (1.6 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$20,000
County
Beaufort County
Touchdown point
35.530, -76.630
Lift-off point
35.530, -76.630
Record number
310

What the Weather Service recorded

An F0 tornado touched down briefly near Belhaven blowing the roof off of a welding shop and destroying a single wide mobile home.

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
21:21 UTC21:45 UTCTornado WarningMHX

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 19:47 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.

Newport, NC (KMHX), 12:00Z

10.8 hours before the tornado, 86 km from the path. October 11, 2002.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Newport, NC at 12:00Z on 2002-10-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1084 joules per kilogram, CIN -1, lifted condensation level 539 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 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, Newport, NC at 12:00Z on 2002-10-11The 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 106 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
1084 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-1 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1243 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
539 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
27 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
106 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
188 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.7
Supercell composite
4.9
0-3 km lapse rate
4.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Newport, NC (KMHX), 00:00Z

1.2 hours after it, 86 km from the path. October 12, 2002.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Newport, NC at 00:00Z on 2002-10-12Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1672 joules per kilogram, CIN 0, lifted condensation level 508 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 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, Newport, NC at 00:00Z on 2002-10-12The 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 124 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 33 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
1672 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
0 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1619 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
508 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
33 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
24 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
124 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
185 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
1.0
Supercell composite
7.1
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Washington/Warren_field_aprt (OCW), 38 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
20:59 UTC75.271.6320° 6 kt1013.9RA
21:19 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1013.9+RA
21:39 UTC73.471.6350° 3 kt1013.9-RA
21:59 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1014.2+RA
22:19 UTC73.471.630° 4 kt1013.9+RA
22:39 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1013.5-RA
22:59 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1013.5+RA
23:19 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1013.9-RA
23:39 UTC73.471.6330° 3 kt1014.2-RA
23:59 UTC73.471.6240° 3 kt1014.2-RA
00:19 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1014.2-RA
00:39 UTC73.471.60° 0 kt1014.2

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The radar

The Morehead City radar (KMHX), 87 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:44 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2002 tornado in North CarolinaEvery tornado in North Carolina since 1950Warnings in force in North Carolina nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of October 11, 2002

7 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
October 112:05 AM EDTF1Johnston, NC4.075
October 112:10 AM EDTF1Wilson, NC2.050
October 111:02 PM EDTF2Georgetown, SC1.2408$750,000
October 111:15 PM EDTF1Pitt, NC7.0100$10,000
October 111:38 PM EDTF1Edgecombe, NC2.050
October 115:38 PM EDTF2Beaufort, NC3.0200$3.0 million
October 117:40 PM EDTF0Carteret, NC1.0100

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.