Tornadoes · United States · Oregon · 2015

EF0 tornado, Eugene, Oregon, April 14, 2015

This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Lane County on April 14, 2015, touching down at 5:05 PM PDT and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $25,000 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 14, 2015
Touchdown
5:05 PM PDT (00:05 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$25,000
County
Lane County
Touchdown point
44.013, -123.029
Lift-off point
44.013, -123.029
Record number
1504141805-01

What the Weather Service recorded

A tornado touched down on the Lane Community College Campus damaging three vehicles.

A Lane Community College Official witnessed a rain wrapped tornado that significantly damaged three vehicles. One vehicle was moved around 125 feet and ended upside down on a berm in a parking lot. Estimated wind speeds of 65 to 85 mph is needed to move a car which rates the tornado as an EF0.

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.

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 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.

Salem/Mcnary, OR (KSLE), 00:00Z

0.1 hours before the tornado, 101 km from the path. April 15, 2015.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Salem/Mcnary, OR at 00:00Z on 2015-04-15Temperature 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 -106882, lifted condensation level 988 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Salem/Mcnary, OR at 00:00Z on 2015-04-15The 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 89 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 68 knots.1939587897117136Sfc1 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
-106882 J/kg
Surface CAPE
152 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
988 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
68 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
14 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
89 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
124 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
7.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Salem/Mcnary, OR (KSLE), 12:00Z

11.9 hours after it, 101 km from the path. April 15, 2015.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Salem/Mcnary, OR at 12:00Z on 2015-04-15Temperature 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 -121120, lifted condensation level 807 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Salem/Mcnary, OR at 12:00Z on 2015-04-15The 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 39 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 49 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-121120 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
807 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
49 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
39 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
93 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
2.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Portland,OR radar (KRTX), 189 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 00:04 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
23:05 UTCTORNADO 0EugeneLane, ORAT 405 PM A SHORT DURATION TORNADO TOUCHED DOWN ON THE CAMPUS OF LANE COMMUNITY COLLEGE. A LANE COMMUNITY COLLEGE OFFICIAL WITNESSED A RAIN AND HAIL WRAPPED TORNADO THAT DAMAGED THREE VEHICLES SIGNIFICANTLY. ONE VEHICLE
23:05 UTCTORNADOEugeneLane, ORAT 405 PM A SMALL TORNADO OF UNKNOWN INTENSITY BRIEFLY TOUCHED DOWN ON THE CAMPUS OF LANE COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE. A LANE COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE OFFICIAL WITNESSED A RAIN AND HAIL WRAPPED TORNADO THAT DAMAGED THREE VE

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2015 tornado in OregonEvery tornado in Oregon since 1950Warnings in force in Oregon nowThe forecast where you are

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.