Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2002

F0 tornado, Girvin, Texas, May 28, 2002

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Pecos County on May 28, 2002, touching down at 6:48 PM CDT and reaching 50 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 28, 2002
Touchdown
6:48 PM CDT (23:48 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
50 yards (46 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Pecos County
Touchdown point
31.080, -102.570
Lift-off point
31.080, -102.570
Record number
105

What the Weather Service recorded

Severe thunderstorms developed during the afternoon and evening of the 28th across the western Permian Basin and the Trans Pecos region. One isolated supercell developed over Crane County...and tracked south across Pecos County. Multiple reports were received of a brief tornado in northern Pecos County...west of Girvin. Other severe storms across the area produced large hail and severe thunderstorm wind gusts.

A motorists and local law enforcement officials witnessed a brief tornado west of highway 67.

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.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
23:13 UTC00:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningMAF
23:59 UTC01:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningMAF

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, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 20:19 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.

Midland Regional, TX (KMAF), 12:00Z

11.8 hours before the tornado, 103 km from the path. May 28, 2002.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Midland Regional, TX at 12:00Z on 2002-05-28Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 2056 joules per kilogram, CIN -174, lifted condensation level 696 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, Midland Regional, TX at 12:00Z on 2002-05-28The 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 202 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 46 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
2056 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-174 J/kg
Surface CAPE
304 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
696 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
46 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
19 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
202 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
163 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
3.8
0-3 km lapse rate
4.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Midland Regional, TX (KMAF), 00:00Z

0.2 hours after it, 103 km from the path. May 29, 2002.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Midland Regional, TX at 00:00Z on 2002-05-29Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 3374 joules per kilogram, CIN -7, lifted condensation level 1564 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCLEL10008507005003002001001 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, Midland Regional, TX at 00:00Z on 2002-05-29The 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 6 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 34 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
3374 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-7 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3587 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1564 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
34 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
4 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
6 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-36 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.3
Supercell composite
3.1
0-3 km lapse rate
8.8 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Fort Stockton (FST), 38 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
21:53 UTC9541350° 9 kt1010.8
22:53 UTC9540320° 9 kt1010.2
23:53 UTC8761130° 13 kt181010.2
00:29 UTC82.45960° 23 kt311011.9HZ
00:31 UTC80.65970° 30 kt341011.9HZ
00:41 UTC78.848.290° 20 kt1012.2HZ
00:53 UTC795090° 19 kt1012.2

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

The radar

The Midland/Odessa radar (KMAF), 103 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 23:48 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2002 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 28, 2002

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 287:18 PM CDTF0Wilkin, MN0.225
May 287:29 PM CDTF0Wilkin, MN0.225

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.