Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2004

F0 tornado, Roma, Texas, April 2, 2004

This F0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Starr County on April 2, 2004, touching down at 8:30 PM CST and reaching 20 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
April 2, 2004
Touchdown
8:30 PM CST (02:30 UTC)
Path length
0.1 miles (0.2 km)
Path width
20 yards (18 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
County
Starr County
Touchdown point
26.420, -99.100
Lift-off point
26.420, -99.100
Record number
226

What the Weather Service recorded

Local law enforcement reported a tornado just west of Roma. The tornado moved very slowly south with time and produced no damage before dissipating.

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
01:15 UTC02:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningBRO
02:00 UTC03:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningBRO
02:47 UTC03:30 UTCTornado WarningBRO
03:34 UTC03:45 UTCTornado WarningBRO

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 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.

Brownsville Intl, TX (KBRO), 00:00Z

2.5 hours before the tornado, 179 km from the path. April 3, 2004.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Brownsville Intl, TX at 00:00Z on 2004-04-03Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1228 joules per kilogram, CIN -50, lifted condensation level 708 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, Brownsville Intl, TX at 00:00Z on 2004-04-03The 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 34 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 47 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
1228 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-50 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1803 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
708 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
47 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
4 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
34 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
60 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.3
Supercell composite
1.6
0-3 km lapse rate
5.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Brownsville Intl, TX (KBRO), 12:00Z

9.5 hours after it, 179 km from the path. April 3, 2004.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Brownsville Intl, TX at 12:00Z on 2004-04-03Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 1473 joules per kilogram, CIN -2, lifted condensation level 576 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, Brownsville Intl, TX at 12:00Z on 2004-04-03The 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 -4 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 25 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
1473 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-2 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1440 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
576 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
25 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-4 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
128 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
-0.0
Supercell composite
-0.2
0-3 km lapse rate
4.9 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Mcallen/Miller International (MFE), 90 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
00:53 UTC7467140° 15 kt1010.5
01:31 UTC73.466.2120° 15 kt1011.5
01:53 UTC7467130° 12 kt1012.5
02:53 UTC7466130° 11 kt1014.2
03:53 UTC7366130° 12 kt1013.9

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

The radar

The Brownsville radar (KBRO), 177 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 02:29 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 2004 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.