Tornadoes · United States · Ohio · 2018

EF0 tornado, Newport, Ohio, April 3, 2018

This EF0 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Madison County on April 3, 2018, touching down at 5:14 PM EDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $60,000 of property damage.

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.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. 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.

  4. 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.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. 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.

  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
EF0
Date
April 3, 2018
Touchdown
5:14 PM EDT (21:14 UTC)
Lifted
5:15 PM EDT (21:15 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$60,000
County
Madison County
Touchdown point
39.859, -83.495
Lift-off point
39.860, -83.492
Record number
1804031514-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Severe thunderstorms and tornadoes developed ahead of a strong cold front. Between one to three inches of rain fell across the region.

The tornado appears to have touched down at a farm on Roberts Mill Road, where several barns sustained heavy damage. These barns had complete roof removal and the collapse of exterior walls. Barn roofing and wall material was thrown west- northwest across Roberts Mill Road into the tops of trees of adjacent properties, and strewn across fields on the west side of Roberts Mill Road. The damage is consistent with wind speeds around 85 mph.||Other barn damage observed on State Route 38 south of Newport, Old Xenia Road SW south of London, and on State Route 56 southeast of London, was all determined to be nontornadic with no conclusive components of typical tornado damage.

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

The warnings

32 minutes of warning. NWS ILN issued a tornado warning for this county at 20:42 UTC, 32 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 21:15 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 17:16 UTC and running to 23:33 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
11:23 UTC06:00 UTCFlash Flood WatchILN
17:16 UTC23:33 UTCTornado WatchILN
20:42 UTC21:15 UTCTornado WarningILN
21:04 UTC21:30 UTCTornado WarningILN
21:17 UTC22:45 UTCFlood AdvisoryILN
21:23 UTC21:32 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningILN
21:23 UTC21:37 UTCTornado WarningILN
23:33 UTC01:51 UTCTornado WatchILN

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 Enhanced Risk, with a 0.10 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 19:33 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

9.2 hours before the tornado, 54 km from the path. April 3, 2018.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 12:00Z on 2018-04-03Temperature 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 -76234, lifted condensation level 542 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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 2018-04-03The 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 358 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 58 knots.19395878Sfc1 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
-76234 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
542 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
58 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
47 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
358 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
356 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
3.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

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

2.8 hours after it, 54 km from the path. April 4, 2018.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Cncnati-Daytn, OH at 00:00Z on 2018-04-04Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 67 joules per kilogram, CIN -109, lifted condensation level 1229 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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 2018-04-04The 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 242 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 61 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
67 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-109 J/kg
Surface CAPE
331 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1229 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
61 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
27 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
242 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
401 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.7
0-3 km lapse rate
6.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Cincinnati radar (KILN), 56 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:11 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)ReportWhereCountyRemark
20:40 UTCTSTM WND DMG3 Ssw XeniaGreene, OHTREES AND FENCE DOWN ON KREPPS ROAD. TIME ESTIMATED FROM RADAR.
20:42 UTCTSTM WND DMG6 Se FairbornGreene, OHTWO HOUSES WITH STRUCTUAL DAMAGE. BARN DAMAGED.
20:45 UTCTSTM WND DMG4 N XeniaGreene, OHNUMEROUS TREES DOWN NEAR THE INTERSECTION OF US 68 AND ROUTE 235
20:45 UTCTORNADO 15 Ene BeavercreekGreene, OHNWS SURVEY CONFIRMED AND EF1 TORNADO NORTHWEST OF XENIA CONTINUING EAST NORTH OF XENIA AND ENDING JUST SOUTH OF CLIFTON. WIDESPREAD DAMAGE OCCURRED TO AT LEAST 25 PROPERTIES, LARGELY BARN DAMAGE BUT MAJOR ROOF DAMAGE TO
20:56 UTCTSTM WND GST 53Ksgh Springfield AptClark, OH
20:56 UTCTORNADO 13 Wnw SelmaClark, OHNWS SURVEY CONFIRMS AN EF1 TORNADO WEST AND NORTH OF SELMA WITH DAMAGE TO A FARM PROPERTY AS WELL AS SCATTERED TREE DAMAGE.
20:57 UTCTORNADO1 Sw South CharlestonClark, OHTORNADO REPORTED BY LAW ENFORCEMENT. MOVING EAST.
21:14 UTCTORNADO 03 Sw LondonMadison, OHNWS STORM SURVEY CONFIRMS A BRIEF EFO TORNADO IMPACTING SEVERAL BARNS ON ROBERTS MILL ROAD.
21:31 UTCHAIL 1.52 S Grove CityFranklin, OHTIME ESTIMATED FROM RADAR.
21:33 UTCHAIL 0.75Grove CityFranklin, OH
21:37 UTCTSTM WND DMGGrove CityFranklin, OHMULTIPLE UTILITY POLES DOWN
21:37 UTCTORNADO 11 Ssw Grove CityFranklin, OHNWS SURVEY CONFIRMS AN EF1 TORNADO IN GROVE CITY WITH DAMAGE TO ROOFS, GARAGES, AND HIGH TRANSMISSION POWER POLES.
21:38 UTCTSTM WND DMG1 Ene Downtown ColumbusFranklin, OHSIGNIFICANT ROOF AND CHIMNEY DAMAGE. TIME ESTIMATED BASED ON RADAR.
21:43 UTCTSTM WND GST 47Klck Rickenbacker AptFranklin, OH
21:43 UTCHAIL 1.252 Ssw Grove CityFranklin, OHPHOTO VERIFIED.
21:44 UTCHAIL 0.88GroveportFranklin, OH
21:47 UTCHAIL 0.75Slate Run Metro ParkPickaway, OH
21:47 UTCHAIL 1GroveportFranklin, OH
21:49 UTCTSTM WND GST 49Kiln Wilmington AptClinton, OH26043KTS
21:50 UTCHAIL 0.88Ese New HollandPickaway, OH
22:19 UTCFLOODWest JeffersonMadison, OHWATER REPORTED ON SEVERAL ROADWAYS.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2018 tornado in OhioEvery tornado in Ohio since 1950Warnings in force in Ohio nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of April 3, 2018

21 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
April 34:45 PM EDTEF1Greene, OH8.8200$500,000
April 34:56 PM EDTEF1Clark, OH4.3150$85,000
April 34:20 PM CDTEF2Fayette, IL18.2100
April 35:37 PM EDTEF1Franklin, OH2.675$120,000
April 36:14 PM EDTEF0Perry, OH1.350$100,000
April 35:17 PM CDTEF1Williamson, IL10.0125$250,000
April 36:30 PM EDTEF0Fountain, IN2.475$1,000
April 35:39 PM CDTEF1Williamson, IL1.9150$40,000
April 35:47 PM CDTEF2Saline, IL12.3350$507,000
April 35:58 PM CDTEF0Stoddard, MO4.5100$35,000
April 36:06 PM CDTEF1Dunklin, MO6.7200$1.5 million
April 37:11 PM EDTEF0Tippecanoe, IN0.640$25,000
April 36:14 PM CDTEF1New Madrid, MO2.5125$90,000
April 36:29 PM CDTEF1Massac, IL10.675$130,000
April 36:38 PM CDTEF1White, IL2.3225$50,000
April 36:52 PM CDTEF1Grayson, KY0.5100$300,000
April 36:54 PM CDTEF2Livingston, KY4.3300$175,000
April 37:09 PM CDTEF1Hickman, KY0.3100$20,000
April 37:17 PM CDTEF1Hickman, KY0.375$30,000
April 37:36 PM CDTEF1Graves, KY0.875$20,000
April 39:34 PM EDTEF1Boyle, KY0.5100$250,000

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.