Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 1998

F0 tornado, Copley, Ohio, April 9, 1998

This F0 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Summit County on April 9, 1998, touching down at 1:45 PM EDT and reaching 30 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $2,000 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
April 9, 1998
Touchdown
1:45 PM EDT (17:45 UTC)
Path length
0.3 miles (0.5 km)
Path width
30 yards (27 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$2,000
County
Summit County
Touchdown point
41.100, -81.630
Lift-off point
41.100, -81.630
Record number
174

What the Weather Service recorded

A weak tornado touched down briefly near Copley causing some minor roof damage.

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

The warnings

7 minutes of warning. NWS CLE issued a tornado warning for this county at 17:38 UTC, 7 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 18:30 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
17:38 UTC18:30 UTCTornado WarningCLE

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 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.

Pittsburgh, PA (KPIT), 12:00Z

5.8 hours before the tornado, 150 km from the path. April 9, 1998.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Pittsburgh, PA at 12:00Z on 1998-04-09Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -68603, lifted condensation level 597 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Pittsburgh, PA at 12:00Z on 1998-04-09The 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 154 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 65 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-68603 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
597 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
65 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
154 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
357 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Pittsburgh, PA (KPIT), 00:00Z

6.2 hours after it, 150 km from the path. April 10, 1998.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Pittsburgh, PA at 00:00Z on 1998-04-10Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 3 joules per kilogram, CIN -10, lifted condensation level 750 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, Pittsburgh, PA at 00:00Z on 1998-04-10The 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 -58 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 11 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
3 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-10 J/kg
Surface CAPE
30 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
750 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
11 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-58 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
9 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Cleveland radar (KCLE), 40 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 17:42 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 1998 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 9, 1998

8 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 95:45 AM EDTF3Bryan, GA8.0440217$2.7 million
April 96:22 AM EDTF1Jasper, SC1.0150$50,000
April 96:35 AM EDTF2Long, GA24.5400431$38 million
April 91:45 PM EDTF0Lorain, OH0.130
April 92:30 PM EDTF0Portage, OH0.130
April 92:30 PM EDTF1Beaver, PA0.250$10,000
April 93:28 PM EDTF0Trumbull, OH0.130
April 94:00 PM EDTF0City of Chesapeake, VA5.050$30,000

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.