Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 2000

F0 tornado, Lancaster to Bremen, Ohio, September 23, 2000

From Lancaster to Bremen, this F0 tornado ran 0.5 miles across Fairfield County on September 23, 2000, touching down at 5:45 PM EDT and reaching 50 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
September 23, 2000
Touchdown
5:45 PM EDT (21:45 UTC)
Path length
0.5 miles (0.8 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$30,000
County
Fairfield County
Touchdown point
39.720, -82.600
Lift-off point
39.720, -82.600
Record number
1052

What the Weather Service recorded

A tornado made a few brief touchdowns in Lancaster destroying a garage and knocking down some trees and power lines.

A tornado touched down in the eastern part of the county causing damage to a home and garage.

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

The warnings

16 minutes of warning. NWS ILN issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:29 UTC, 16 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:00 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:00 UTC21:30 UTCTornado WarningILN
21:29 UTC22:00 UTCTornado WarningILN
21:59 UTC22:40 UTCTornado WarningILN

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 19:42 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

9.8 hours before the tornado, 108 km from the path. September 23, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2000-09-23Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 147 joules per kilogram, CIN -110, lifted condensation level 861 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 2000-09-23The 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 17 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
147 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-110 J/kg
Surface CAPE
50 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
861 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
17 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
24 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
124 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
82 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

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

2.2 hours after it, 108 km from the path. September 24, 2000.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2000-09-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 620 joules per kilogram, CIN -20, lifted condensation level 685 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 2000-09-24The 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 154 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 26 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
620 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-20 J/kg
Surface CAPE
91 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
685 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
154 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
159 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
1.5
0-3 km lapse rate
4.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Lancaster (LHQ), 6 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
19:53 UTC7773110° 8 kt1011.2
20:02 UTC7773.4130° 8 kt1010.8
20:18 UTC7773.4130° 10 kt1010.8
20:41 UTC75.273.4140° 9 kt1010.2VCTS
20:53 UTC7673140° 8 kt1010.5VCTS -RA
21:44 UTC73.473.4320° 10 kt1008.8TS
21:53 UTC7169360° 26 kt341008.5-TSRA BR
22:01 UTC71.666.2270° 20 kt331009.8-TSRA BR
22:03 UTC71.666.2300° 14 kt281010.5-TSRA BR
22:07 UTC69.866.2280° 12 kt281010.5-TSRA
22:26 UTC6866.2360° 11 kt181010.5-TSRA
22:44 UTC69.869.840° 21 kt301010.2-TSRA BR
22:53 UTC716830° 14 kt301010.8-TSRA BR
23:02 UTC686850° 9 kt1010.5VCTS -RA BR
23:20 UTC69.86870° 6 kt1010.8
23:43 UTC686880° 3 kt1010.8

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

The radar

The Cincinnati radar (KILN), 110 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:44 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 2000 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of September 23, 2000

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
September 235:15 PM EDTF0Pickaway, OH0.120
September 236:15 PM EDTF1Fairfield, OH0.250$150,000

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.