Tornadoes · United States · North Carolina · 2012

EF0 tornado, Gurlock, North Carolina, July 10, 2012

This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Hyde County on July 10, 2012, touching down at 5:40 PM EDT and reaching 20 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
July 10, 2012
Touchdown
5:40 PM EDT (21:40 UTC)
Lifted
5:41 PM EDT (21:41 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Hyde County
Touchdown point
35.420, -76.070
Lift-off point
35.418, -76.069
Record number
1207101540-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Scattered to numerous showers and thunderstorms developed along a cold front that moved slowly south through eastern North Carolina during the afternoon and evening of July 10th. One storm produced a brief tornado in Mainland Hyde County.

Motorist traveling on Highway 264 spotted a weak tornado to the east near the Pamlico Sound. The tornado occurred in a field and produced no damage.

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

The warnings

9 minutes of warning. NWS MHX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:31 UTC, 9 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:45 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:31 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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:45 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

9.7 hours before the tornado, 102 km from the path. July 10, 2012.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Newport, NC at 12:00Z on 2012-07-10Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 554 joules per kilogram, CIN -87, lifted condensation level 977 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, Newport, NC at 12:00Z on 2012-07-10The 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 0 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 10 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
554 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-87 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1336 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
977 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
7 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
0 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
46 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

Newport, NC (KMHX), 00:00Z

2.3 hours after it, 102 km from the path. July 11, 2012.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Newport, NC at 00:00Z on 2012-07-11Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 407 joules per kilogram, CIN -90, lifted condensation level 634 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, Newport, NC at 00:00Z on 2012-07-11The 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 -50 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 13 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
407 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-90 J/kg
Surface CAPE
927 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
634 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
8 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-50 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
89 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Morehead City radar (KMHX), 102 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:41 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
21:40 UTCTORNADO1 Ene Mount PleasantOuter Banks Hyde, NCMOTORIST REPORTED A TORNADO WHILE RIDING DOWN HWY-264 MOVING TOWARD THE PAMLICO SOUND

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2012 tornado in North CarolinaEvery tornado in North Carolina since 1950Warnings in force in North Carolina 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.