Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 1994

F0 tornado, of Del Rio, Texas, June 23, 1994

This F0 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Val Verde County on June 23, 1994, touching down at 5:15 PM CDT and reaching 20 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $50 to $500 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 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
June 23, 1994
Touchdown
5:15 PM CDT (22:15 UTC)
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$50 to $500
County
Val Verde County
Touchdown point
29.370, -100.900
Record number
581

What the Weather Service recorded

A second thunderstorm developed from the remains of the first storm that had struck Val Verde County. At 1615 CST, a Val Verde Sheriff's Department spotter reported small tornado six miles south of Del Rio. It was very small and short lived. No damage was noted as the area was later searched. Shortly afterward, winds blew a 120-foot by 25-foot section of metal roof off the La Paloma Shopping Center. The roof was blown some 90 feet and landed on eight automobiles in the parking lot of the shopping center. Additional damage was reported to the roof of a church in Del Rio.

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

The warnings

0 minutes of warning. NWS EWX issued a tornado warning for this county at 22:15 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 23:00 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
21:00 UTC21:55 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningEWX
22:15 UTC23:00 UTCTornado WarningEWX

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 General Thunderstorms Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 06:07 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.

Del Rio, TX (KDRT), 12:00Z

10.3 hours before the tornado, 6 km from the path. June 23, 1994.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Del Rio, TX at 12:00Z on 1994-06-23Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2224 joules per kilogram, CIN -126, lifted condensation level 1111 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Del Rio, TX at 12:00Z on 1994-06-23The 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 73 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 10 knots.1939Sfc1 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
2224 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-126 J/kg
Surface CAPE
400 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1111 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
10 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
22 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
73 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
160 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Del Rio, TX (KDRT), 00:00Z

1.7 hours after it, 6 km from the path. June 24, 1994.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Del Rio, TX at 00:00Z on 1994-06-24Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 215 joules per kilogram, CIN -234, lifted condensation level 2572 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLLFCEL10008507005003002001001 km2 km3 km6 km9 km12 km15 km-30°-20°-10°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, Del Rio, TX at 00:00Z on 1994-06-24The 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 -161 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 21 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
215 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-234 J/kg
Surface CAPE
84 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
2572 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
21 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-161 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-67 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
-0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1994 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of June 23, 1994

4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
June 231:55 PM ESTF1Jay, IN0.5110$50,000 to $500,000
June 232:30 PM ESTF0Jay, IN0.130
June 236:32 PM CDTF0Kerr, TX0.250$5,000 to $50,000
June 239:14 PM CDTF0Burke, ND0.110

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.