Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 1983

F1 tornado, Harris County, Texas, March 30, 1983

This F1 tornado ran 0.3 miles across Harris County on March 30, 1983, touching down at 10:02 AM CST and reaching 40 yards wide. It killed nobody and injured 2, and did $5,000 to $50,000 of property damage.

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 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.

The record

Rating
F1
Date
March 30, 1983
Touchdown
10:02 AM CST (16:02 UTC)
Path length
0.3 miles (0.5 km)
Path width
40 yards (37 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
2
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Harris County
Touchdown point
29.820, -95.050
Record number
125

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.

Lake Charles Mun, LA (KLCH), 12:00Z

4.0 hours before the tornado, 181 km from the path. March 30, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 12:00Z on 1983-03-30Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 19 joules per kilogram, CIN -145, lifted condensation level 457 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, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 12:00Z on 1983-03-30The 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 204 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 50 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
19 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-145 J/kg
Surface CAPE
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
457 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
50 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
19 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
204 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
246 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
1.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.4 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Lake Charles Mun, LA (KLCH), 00:00Z

8.0 hours after it, 181 km from the path. March 31, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 00:00Z on 1983-03-31Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 152 joules per kilogram, CIN -221, lifted condensation level 758 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, Lake Charles Mun, LA at 00:00Z on 1983-03-31The 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 -37 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 37 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
152 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-221 J/kg
Surface CAPE
14 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
758 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
37 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-37 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
21 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
-0.4
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Houston/Ellington (EFD), 26 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
14:45 UTC50° 5 kt1016.9FZFG
15:00 UTC646160° 4 kt1016.9FG
15:03 UTC30° 4 kt1016.9FZFG
15:22 UTC60° 4 kt1016.9FZFG
15:44 UTC60° 3 kt1016.9SHRA FZFG
16:00 UTC6561190° 2 kt1017.3-SHRA FG
16:01 UTC190° 3 kt1017.3FZFG
16:17 UTC310° 8 kt1017.3SHRA FZFG
16:31 UTC10° 16 kt221019SHRA FZFG
16:38 UTC360° 18 kt1018.3+TSRA FZFG
17:00 UTC6458350° 18 kt251017.9TSRA FG
17:05 UTC340° 16 kt1017.9TS
18:00 UTC6357100° 7 kt1016.9

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1983 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas 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.