F0 tornado, Red Rock, Oklahoma, May 8, 2003

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.

Rating

F0

Date

May 8, 2003

Touchdown

6:08 PM CDT (23:08 UTC)

Path length

0.8 miles (1.3 km)

Path width

50 yards (46 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$3,000

County

Noble County

Touchdown point

36.470, -97.180

Lift-off point

36.470, -97.170

Record number

1128

Two tornadic supercells produced four tornadoes during the afternoon hours of May 8, 2003. One supercell produced three tornadoes that affected Moore, southern Oklahoma City, Midwest City, and Choctaw. A few locations in Moore and southeast Oklahoma City had also been hit by an F5 tornado that moved through the area on May 3, 1999. The General Motors Plant in southeast Oklahoma City sustained some of the most significant damage. This event was the second tornadic event of the day. Several tornadoes moved across south central Oklahoma during the early morning hours of May 8th (refer to appropriate data). This event was also the first of two days in a row where the Oklahoma City Metropolitan area was affected by tornadoes (refer to May 9, 2003 data). These thunderstorms developed near and along a strong dryline located across central Oklahoma.

This short lived F0 tornado, spotted by law enforcement, occurred in an area that only sustained tree damage. No other damage was found. The supercell that produced this brief tornado eventually moved into Osage County producing a long track tornado.

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

13 minutes of warning. NWS OUN issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:55 UTC, 13 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:45 UTC.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a High Risk, with a 0.25 chance of a tornado within 25 miles, in the hatched area where significant tornadoes were expected. The outlook in force was issued at 20:14 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 Vance AFB radar (KVNX), 90 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:10 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.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2003 tornado in OklahomaEvery tornado in Oklahoma since 1950Warnings in force in Oklahoma nowThe forecast where you are

46 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.