Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 2009
EF0 tornado, Weimers Mill, Ohio, August 19, 2009
This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Darke County on August 19, 2009, touching down at 6:30 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.
EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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
- August 19, 2009
- Touchdown
- 6:30 PM EDT (22:30 UTC)
- Lifted
- 6:31 PM EDT (22:31 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
- Darke County
- Touchdown point
- 40.108, -84.674
- Lift-off point
- 40.109, -84.672
- Record number
- 0908191630-01
What the Weather Service recorded
A series of severe storms brought damaging winds and hail to the area during the evening hours of August 19th. One tornado was also reported.
A weak tornado touched down in an open field two miles west of Greenville near State Highway 502. Since this tornado occurred in an open field there was no crop or structural damage.
From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.
The warnings
24 minutes of warning. NWS ILN issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:06 UTC, 24 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:45 UTC.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 22:16 UTC and running to 02:38 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21:13 UTC | 22:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | ILN |
| 22:06 UTC | 22:45 UTC | Tornado Warning | ILN |
| 22:16 UTC | 02:38 UTC | Tornado Watch | ILN |
| 23:12 UTC | 23:45 UTC | Tornado Warning | ILN |
| 23:44 UTC | 00:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | ILN |
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, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 21:34 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
10.5 hours before the tornado, 106 km from the path. August 19, 2009.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1143 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -5 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1533 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 491 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 32 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 14 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 40 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 49 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.1
- Supercell composite
- 0.9
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 5.1 K/km
Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 00:00Z
1.5 hours after it, 106 km from the path. August 20, 2009.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 2004 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -3 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 3117 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 904 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 31 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 13 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 69 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 144 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 1.0
- Supercell composite
- 7.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 7.0 K/km
The radar
The Cincinnati radar (KILN), 106 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 22:28 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) | Report | Where | County | Remark |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22:23 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 4 Ene Palestine | Darke, OH | SEVERAL REPORTS OF A FUNNEL CLOUD BETWEEN GREENVILLE AND PALESTINE. |
| 22:30 UTC | TORNADO 0 | 3 W Greenville | Darke, OH | A VERY BRIEF EF0 TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN IN AN OPEN FIELD 3 MILES WEST OF GREENVILLE. NO CROP OR STRUCTURAL DAMAGE WAS REPORTED. |
| 23:17 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Ansonia | Darke, OH | A FEW TREES DOWN. |
| 23:22 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Ansonia | Darke, OH | |
| 23:25 UTC | TSTM WND GST 60 | North Star | Darke, OH | |
| 23:28 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Rossburg | Darke, OH | |
| 23:32 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 4 W Sidney | Shelby, OH | TREES DOWNED. WINDOWS DAMAGED ON A HOME. |
| 23:35 UTC | HAIL 0.88 | 1 Nw Sidney | Shelby, OH | NICKEL SIZE HAIL REPORTED ALONG WITH WINDS GUSTING AT 40 TO 50 MPH ON CISCO ROAD. |
| 23:36 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Sidney | Shelby, OH | |
| 23:40 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Sidney | Shelby, OH | TREES DOWNED. A ROOF WAS DAMAGED ON A MOBILE HOME. |
| 23:43 UTC | HAIL 1 | Sidney | Shelby, OH | SMALL LIMBS DOWN ALONG WITH QUARTER SIZE HAIL. |
| 23:48 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | Sidney | Shelby, OH | REPORTED NEAR INTERSTATE 75 AT EXIT 90. |
| 23:50 UTC | HAIL 2 | Sidney | Shelby, OH | |
| 23:57 UTC | HAIL 1.75 | Sidney | Shelby, OH | |
| 23:57 UTC | HEAVY RAIN 1 | Fort Loramie | Shelby, OH | 1 INCH PER HOUR RATES OF RAINFALL. |
| 00:03 UTC | FLOOD | Riverside | Montgomery, OH | STREET FLOODING REPORTED IN RIVERSIDE WITH WATER STALLING VEHICLES. |
| 00:06 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 S New Carlisle | Clark, OH | LARGE BRANCHES DOWN IN BETHEL TOWNSHIP. |
| 00:10 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | New Carlisle | Clark, OH | A LARGE TREE WAS DOWNED ON A HOUSE. |
| 00:19 UTC | HAIL 0.75 | New Carlisle | Clark, OH | |
| 00:22 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Medway | Clark, OH | TREES DOWN. |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2009 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of August 19, 2009
29 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 19 | 1:50 PM CDT | EF0 | Hennepin, MN | 4.3 | 500 | $500,000 | ||
| August 19 | 2:10 PM CDT | EF1 | Scott, IL | 15.1 | 250 | $395,000 | ||
| August 19 | 2:16 PM CDT | EF1 | Dakota, MN | 1.6 | 50 | $25,000 | ||
| August 19 | 2:40 PM CDT | EF1 | Washington, MN | 0.7 | 75 | $100,000 | ||
| August 19 | 2:46 PM CDT | EF2 | Morgan, IL | 19.1 | 440 | 3 | $4.1 million | |
| August 19 | 2:57 PM CDT | EF0 | Pierce, WI | 0.2 | 10 | |||
| August 19 | 3:05 PM CDT | EF0 | Saint Croix, WI | 0.4 | 25 | $25,000 | ||
| August 19 | 3:07 PM CDT | EF0 | Anoka, MN | 0.0 | 10 | |||
| August 19 | 3:09 PM CDT | EF0 | Chickasaw, IA | 1.1 | 40 | $20,000 | ||
| August 19 | 3:17 PM CDT | EF1 | Sangamon, IL | 12.9 | 200 | $200,000 | ||
| August 19 | 3:19 PM CDT | EF3 | Sangamon, IL | 24.3 | 880 | 19 | $18 million | |
| August 19 | 3:25 PM CDT | EF0 | Washington, MN | 0.7 | 40 | $25,000 | ||
| August 19 | 3:50 PM CDT | EF0 | Howard, IA | 0.1 | 20 | |||
| August 19 | 3:50 PM CDT | EF0 | Fayette, IA | 3.5 | 40 | $22,000 | ||
| August 19 | 3:58 PM CDT | EF0 | Saint Croix, WI | 1.4 | 25 | |||
| August 19 | 4:00 PM CDT | EF0 | Chisago, MN | 0.9 | 200 | $100,000 | ||
| August 19 | 4:00 PM CDT | EF0 | Winneshiek, IA | 5.3 | 25 | $5,000 | ||
| August 19 | 4:04 PM CDT | EF0 | DeWitt, IL | 2.4 | 15 | $10,000 | ||
| August 19 | 4:11 PM CDT | EF0 | Saint Croix, WI | 1.7 | 25 | |||
| August 19 | 4:27 PM CDT | EF0 | McLean, IL | 2.5 | 20 | |||
| August 19 | 4:30 PM CDT | EF1 | Buchanan, IA | 2.2 | 100 | $75,000 | ||
| August 19 | 5:10 PM CDT | EF0 | Vermilion, IL | 4.7 | 50 | $80,000 | ||
| August 19 | 5:20 PM CDT | EF0 | Jones, IA | 0.1 | 50 | $5,000 | ||
| August 19 | 6:00 PM CDT | EF1 | Kane, IL | 1.0 | 40 | $25,000 | ||
| August 19 | 6:00 PM CDT | EF1 | Iroquois, IL | 2.8 | 50 | $100,000 | ||
| August 19 | 6:15 PM CDT | EF0 | Kane, IL | 0.8 | 30 | |||
| August 19 | 6:28 PM CDT | EF0 | Brown, MN | 3.7 | 20 | |||
| August 19 | 7:32 PM CDT | EF2 | Porter, IN | 4.0 | 60 | $1.5 million | ||
| August 19 | 12:05 AM CDT | EF1 | Texas, MO | 0.8 | 100 | 1 | $25,000 |
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.