Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 1999

F0 tornado, Loveland to Pleasant Plain, Ohio, August 24, 1999

From Loveland to Pleasant Plain, this F0 tornado ran 10.0 miles across Warren and Clermont counties on August 24, 1999, touching down at 3:28 PM EDT and reaching 500 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $50,000 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
August 24, 1999
Touchdown
3:28 PM EDT (19:28 UTC)
Path length
10.0 miles (16.1 km)
Path width
500 yards (457 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$50,000
Counties
Warren and Clermont counties
Touchdown point
39.270, -84.220
Lift-off point
39.300, -84.130
Record number
1319

What the Weather Service recorded

A weak tornado affected the northwest part of the county before tracking into Warren county. Trees were downed and some homes and barns were damaged.

A weak tornado tracked out of Clermont county into the south-central part of the county. Trees were downed and some damage occurred to homes and barns.

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.

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 15:53 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.

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 12:00Z

7.5 hours before the tornado, 36 km from the path. August 24, 1999.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 1999-08-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 202 joules per kilogram, CIN -132, lifted condensation level 1212 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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 1999-08-24The 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 64 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 22 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
202 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-132 J/kg
Surface CAPE
200 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1212 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
22 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
13 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
64 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
38 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 00:00Z

4.5 hours after it, 36 km from the path. August 25, 1999.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 1999-08-25Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 38 joules per kilogram, CIN -120, lifted condensation level 1135 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, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 1999-08-25The 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 -90 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 35 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
38 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-120 J/kg
Surface CAPE
348 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1135 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
35 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-90 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-24 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
-0.0
Supercell composite
-0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Cincinnat/Lunken (LUK), 29 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
17:53 UTC8169 4 kt1009.5HZ
18:35 UTC80.669.8 1008.8
18:53 UTC7269340° 13 kt1009.5+TSRA
19:03 UTC71.669.8330° 9 kt1009.5
19:13 UTC71.669.850° 6 kt1009.5
19:20 UTC71.669.8100° 7 kt1009.8
19:53 UTC72690° 0 kt1009.1
20:53 UTC737080° 8 kt1009.5
21:01 UTC73.469.880° 7 kt1009.5
21:20 UTC71.66870° 8 kt1009.1

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1999 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 24, 1999

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 241:20 PM EDTF0Palm Beach, FL0.110
August 245:45 PM CDTF0Knox, TX0.50

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.