F1 tornado, Tioga, Pennsylvania, July 8, 1997

1. F040 to 72 mph

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

2. F173 to 112 mphthis tornado

   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

F1

Date

July 8, 1997

Touchdown

6:00 PM EDT (22:00 UTC)

Path length

8.0 miles (12.9 km)

Path width

100 yards (91 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Tioga County

Touchdown point

41.900, -77.130

Lift-off point

41.900, -77.130

Record number

466

41/53/50N, 77/16/47W to 41/54N, 77/07/37W. The Elkhorn Creek tornado touched down in Tioga County around 6:00 p.m. EDT Tuesday, July 8th, about 8 miles west of the town of Tioga, just southwest of Elbridge. The storm tracked east following Elkhorn Creek for nearly 8 miles into the town of Tioga.The storm took part of a roof off of a barn and destroyed a metal farm equipment building at the Keith Hamblin farm close to the initial touchdown. Width at that point was probably 50 yards. The storm continued east, taking down hundreds of trees along the track west of Tioga. Winds probably peaked at less than 90 mph, enough to take down trees and destroy the metal building, but stronger-built parts of the barn remained intact.At several points along the path, there was good indication of rotation in the direction trees fell. Parts of the barn roof of the Hamblin farm were actually blown westward by the storm, while debris from the farm equipment building was spread eastward. East of the Hamblin farm, rotational debris may have been as wide as 100 yards with tree damage north and south of the main path, extending out in excess of 1/2-mile.

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

19 minutes of warning. NWS CTP issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:41 UTC, 19 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:45 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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:06 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 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.

Elmira / Corning (ELM), 34 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of airport observations.

The Binghamton radar (KBGM), 100 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:51 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 1997 tornado in PennsylvaniaEvery tornado in Pennsylvania since 1950Warnings in force in Pennsylvania nowThe forecast where you are

2 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.