Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 2010
EF0 tornado, Van Wert Arpt to Van Wert Circle S Ar, Ohio, June 23, 2010
From Van Wert Arpt to Van Wert Circle S Ar, this EF0 tornado ran 0.9 miles across Van Wert County on June 23, 2010, touching down at 9:50 PM EDT and reaching 50 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
- June 23, 2010
- Touchdown
- 9:50 PM EDT (01:50 UTC)
- Lifted
- 9:51 PM EDT (01:51 UTC)
- On the ground
- 1 minutes
- Path length
- 0.9 miles (1.5 km)
- Path width
- 50 yards (46 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Van Wert County
- Touchdown point
- 40.830, -84.597
- Lift-off point
- 40.830, -84.579
- Record number
- 1006231950-01
What the Weather Service recorded
A line of severe storms advanced from Illinois and intensified further as it interacted with strong instability and shear. The line took on a line echo wave pattern (LEWP), resulting in an abundance of wind damage reports, including a focused micro-burst in Williams County. A brief tornado also developed in Van Wert County, resulting in some damage.
Emergency management officials surveyed an area of damage south of Van Wert and determined a circulation touched down in a wheat field a quarter mile west of Dustman Drive and US 127. The circulation continued along Dustman Road, with most of the damage being to trees. A few limbs fell onto homes, causing minor damage. In addition, some shingle damage occurred. The roof of a barn was torn off near US 127 as well. Winds are estimated to be between 80 and 85 mph with a maximum width of the tornado of around 50 yards.
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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.
The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 23:16 UTC and running to 04:13 UTC.
| Issued (UTC) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 13:01 UTC | 06:40 UTC | Flash Flood Watch | IWX |
| 17:43 UTC | 19:00 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Watch | IWX |
| 17:45 UTC | 18:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | IWX |
| 18:12 UTC | 18:40 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | IWX |
| 23:16 UTC | 04:13 UTC | Tornado Watch | IWX |
| 02:10 UTC | 03:00 UTC | Tornado Warning | IWX |
| 02:31 UTC | 03:13 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | IWX |
| 02:39 UTC | 03:13 UTC | Tornado Warning | IWX |
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 Moderate Risk, with a 0.05 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 01:00 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), 00:00Z
1.8 hours before the tornado, 169 km from the path. June 24, 2010.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1480 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -28 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 2453 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 1320 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 33 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 14 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 88 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 204 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.3
- Supercell composite
- 3.3
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 6.1 K/km
Cncnati-Daytn, OH (KILN), 12:00Z
10.2 hours after it, 169 km from the path. June 24, 2010.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 1484 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -34 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1006 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 866 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 38 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 34 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 162 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 171 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 1.1
- Supercell composite
- 6.6
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 4.9 K/km
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 02:30 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 3 N Convoy | Van Wert, OH | NUMEROUS TREES DOWN |
| 02:35 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 1 S Scott | Van Wert, OH | TREE DOWN BLOCKING ROAD |
| 02:35 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Defiance | Defiance, OH | SEVERAL TREES DOWN |
| 02:40 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Latty | Paulding, OH | POWER LINES AND SMALL TREE BRANCHES DOWN...TIME ESTIMATED FROM RADAR |
| 02:59 UTC | TSTM WND GST 62 | Delphos | Allen, OH | |
| 03:24 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 2 S Wapakoneta | Auglaize, OH | POWER POLES WERE SNAPPED IN HALF. |
| 03:24 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Buckland | Auglaize, OH | TREES DOWN ACROSS THE ROAD. |
| 03:24 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | Wapakoneta | Auglaize, 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 2010 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of June 23, 2010
11 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 23 | 2:18 AM CDT | EF1 | Bremer, IA | 0.3 | 35 | $10,000 | ||
| June 23 | 3:22 AM CDT | EF0 | Crawford, WI | 3.9 | 25 | $5,000 | ||
| June 23 | 6:26 PM CDT | EF1 | Cook, IL | 2.4 | 200 | $100,000 | ||
| June 23 | 8:59 PM EDT | EF1 | Elkhart, IN | 11.8 | 50 | $300,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:09 PM EDT | EF1 | Elkhart, IN | 1.0 | 50 | $500,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:14 PM EDT | EF1 | Kosciusko, IN | 4.8 | 150 | $300,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:15 PM EDT | EF1 | Elkhart, IN | 3.5 | 100 | $50,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:16 PM EDT | EF0 | Elkhart, IN | 0.5 | 25 | $10,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:17 PM EDT | EF0 | Elkhart, IN | 1.9 | 50 | $75,000 | ||
| June 23 | 9:52 PM EDT | EF0 | Washtenaw, MI | 3.7 | 75 | $75,000 | ||
| June 23 | 10:06 PM EDT | EF1 | Monroe, MI | 11.5 | 100 | $100,000 |
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.