Tornadoes · United States · Tennessee · 1996

F0 tornado, Cleveland, Tennessee, May 27, 1996

This F0 tornado ran 3.5 miles across Bradley County on May 27, 1996, touching down at 7:28 PM EDT and reaching 30 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 27, 1996
Touchdown
7:28 PM EDT (23:28 UTC)
Path length
3.5 miles (5.6 km)
Path width
30 yards (27 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Bradley County
Touchdown point
35.170, -84.880
Lift-off point
35.150, -84.820
Record number
238

What the Weather Service recorded

Cooke Manufacturing furniture warehouse in Cleveland was destroyed by a tornado. The tornado also damaged the Blossman Gas Company and a church before hitting a mobile home park. Thirty-five mobile homes were damaged with only very minor

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
23:30 UTC00:15 UTCTornado WarningMRX

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 Slight Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:19 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.

Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 12:00Z

11.5 hours before the tornado, 191 km from the path. May 27, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Nashville Metro, TN at 12:00Z on 1996-05-27Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1038 joules per kilogram, CIN -64, lifted condensation level 1108 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 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, Nashville Metro, TN at 12:00Z on 1996-05-27The 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 184 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 26 knots.193958Sfc1 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
1038 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-64 J/kg
Surface CAPE
727 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1108 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
26 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
27 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
184 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
188 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.5
Supercell composite
2.9
0-3 km lapse rate
4.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Nashville Metro, TN (KBNA), 00:00Z

0.5 hours after it, 191 km from the path. May 28, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Nashville Metro, TN at 00:00Z on 1996-05-28Temperature 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 -67213, lifted condensation level 1204 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, Nashville Metro, TN at 00:00Z on 1996-05-28The 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 103 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 66 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
-67213 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1204 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
66 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
30 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
103 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
175 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Chattanooga/Lovell (CHA), 35 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
22:00 UTC8770210° 15 kt1008.8
23:00 UTC8368290° 26 kt331011.9TS
23:09 UTC310° 20 kt341012.2TS
00:00 UTC7165360° 13 kt1013.2
00:18 UTC TSRA
00:27 UTC60° 10 kt1013.9-TSRA
00:38 UTC50° 10 kt1013.5-RA
01:00 UTC676550° 12 kt1011.9-RA

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1996 tornado in TennesseeEvery tornado in Tennessee since 1950Warnings in force in Tennessee nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 27, 1996

10 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 272:25 PM CDTF3Clark, AR26.0440$1.8 million
May 272:50 PM CDTF1Taylor, IA0.345$2,000
May 272:55 PM CDTF0Ringgold, IA0.125
May 273:15 PM CDTF3Dallas, AR15.0440$130,000
May 273:34 PM CDTF0Decatur, IA0.125
May 273:35 PM CDTF0Saline, AR0.120
May 273:41 PM CDTF0Saline, AR0.120
May 278:30 PM CDTF0Pike, IL1.050
May 278:40 PM CDTF0Adams, IL0.550
May 2710:45 PM CDTF0Sangamon, IL2.540

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.