Tornadoes · United States · South Dakota · 1960

F0 tornado, Todd County, South Dakota, May 18, 1960

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Todd County on May 18, 1960, touching down at 5:10 PM GMT-5 and reaching 10 yards wide. It killed nobody.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  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.

The record

Rating
F0
Date
May 18, 1960
Touchdown
5:10 PM GMT-5 (22:10 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
10 yards (9 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Todd County
Touchdown point
43.320, -100.650
Record number
244

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.

Rapid City, SD (KRAP), 12:00Z

10.2 hours before the tornado, 198 km from the path. May 18, 1960.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Rapid City, SD at 12:00Z on 1960-05-18Temperature 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 -9777, lifted condensation level 1582 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, Rapid City, SD at 12:00Z on 1960-05-18The 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 -66 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 50 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
-9777 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1582 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
50 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
22 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-66 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-40 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Rapid City, SD (KRAP), 00:00Z

1.8 hours after it, 198 km from the path. May 19, 1960.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Rapid City, SD at 00:00Z on 1960-05-19Temperature 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 -12014, lifted condensation level 1172 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, Rapid City, SD at 00:00Z on 1960-05-19The 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 -96 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 67 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
-12014 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1172 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
67 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
18 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-96 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
34 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1960 tornado in South DakotaEvery tornado in South Dakota since 1950Warnings in force in South Dakota nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 18, 1960

16 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 187:00 AM GMT-5F1Barry, MO0.210$500 to $5,000
May 183:45 PM GMT-5F0Taney, MO0.210$50 to $500
May 182:00 PM GMT-7F2Washington, CO0.110under $50
May 184:15 PM GMT-5F1Garvin, OK0.550$500 to $5,000
May 185:00 PM GMT-5F0Marshall, OK0.3100
May 186:00 PM GMT-5F1Rogers, OK0.510$5,000 to $50,000
May 186:16 PM GMT-5F1Graham, KS6.9100$5,000 to $50,000
May 186:30 PM GMT-5F1Washington, OK0.110$500 to $5,000
May 186:30 PM GMT-5F0Eastland, TX0.633
May 187:30 PM GMT-5F2Frontier, NE4.5101$50,000 to $500,000
May 187:43 PM GMT-5F0Jackson, OK0.110
May 1810:00 PM GMT-5F1Garfield, NE0.110$500 to $5,000
May 1810:00 PM GMT-5F2Johnson, AR3.81,760
May 1810:30 PM GMT-5F0Hitchcock, NE0.110$5,000 to $50,000
May 1810:45 PM GMT-5F0Knox, NE0.310$500 to $5,000
May 1810:45 PM GMT-5F0Knox, NE0.310$500 to $5,000

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.