Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2013

EF0 tornado, Alley, Texas, August 14, 2013

This EF0 tornado ran 0.1 miles across Hale County on August 14, 2013, touching down at 10:58 PM CDT and reaching 25 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $250,000 of property damage.

The rating scale

Tracks are drawn in the color of the rating. The Enhanced Fujita scale rates the damage rather than measuring the wind: the speeds are what that damage is taken to imply.

  1. EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado

    Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

  2. EF186 to 110 mph

    Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

  3. EF2111 to 135 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. EF3136 to 165 mph

    Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

  5. EF4166 to 200 mph

    Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

  6. EF5over 200 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
EF0
Date
August 14, 2013
Touchdown
10:58 PM CDT (03:58 UTC)
Lifted
10:59 PM CDT (03:59 UTC)
On the ground
1 minutes
Path length
0.1 miles (0.1 km)
Path width
25 yards (23 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$250,000
County
Hale County
Touchdown point
33.940, -101.900
Lift-off point
33.939, -101.900
Record number
1308142158-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Isolated storms moved south out of the Texas Panhandle, with an isolated supercell developing downstream across Hale County. This storm produced severe wind gusts and hail, along with a brief tornado west of Interstate 27 which damaged several center pivot irrigation systems. The storms also produced severe winds near Ropesville into the early morning hours.

A fire department official reported a brief tornado touchdown west of Interstate 27 and north of Farm to Market Road 54 northwest of Abernathy. Several center pivot irrigation systems were damaged before the tornado lifted.

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

The warnings

4 minutes of warning. NWS LUB issued a tornado warning for this county at 03:54 UTC, 4 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 04:15 UTC.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
02:41 UTC03:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB
03:11 UTC03:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB
03:36 UTC04:00 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB
03:39 UTC04:15 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB
03:54 UTC04:15 UTCTornado WarningLUB
04:14 UTC04:45 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB
04:42 UTC06:30 UTCFlood AdvisoryLUB
04:44 UTC05:30 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningLUB

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 00:43 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.

Amarillo Airport, TX (KAMA), 00:00Z

4.0 hours before the tornado, 145 km from the path. August 15, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Amarillo Airport, TX at 00:00Z on 2013-08-15Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 935 joules per kilogram, CIN -16, lifted condensation level 1391 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, Amarillo Airport, TX at 00:00Z on 2013-08-15The 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 41 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
935 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-16 J/kg
Surface CAPE
2231 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1391 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
41 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
5 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
34 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
146 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.3
Supercell composite
4.9
0-3 km lapse rate
8.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Amarillo Airport, TX (KAMA), 12:00Z

8.0 hours after it, 145 km from the path. August 15, 2013.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Amarillo Airport, TX at 12:00Z on 2013-08-15Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 547 joules per kilogram, CIN -97, lifted condensation level 731 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, Amarillo Airport, TX at 12:00Z on 2013-08-15The 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 84 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 16 knots.1939587897Sfc1 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
547 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-97 J/kg
Surface CAPE
124 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
731 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
16 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
84 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
91 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Lubbock radar (KLBB), 33 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 03:58 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.

What was reported nearby

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

Time (UTC)ReportWhereCountyRemark
02:51 UTCTSTM WND GST 601 Nnw PlainviewHale, TX
02:51 UTCHAIL 11 Nnw PlainviewHale, TX
03:19 UTCHAIL 1.754 E HalfwayHale, TX
06:21 UTCTSTM WND GST 606 Nnw RopesvilleHockley, TXWIND SPEED WAS ESTIMATED TO BE AT LEAST 60 MPH
06:21 UTCHAIL 0.756 Nnw RopesvilleHockley, TXWIND SPEED WAS ESTIMATED TO BE AT LEAST 60 MPH

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2013 tornado in TexasEvery tornado in Texas since 1950Warnings in force in Texas nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 14, 2013

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 145:45 PM CDTEF0Sherman, TX1.050
August 146:40 PM CDTEF0Hutchinson, TX0.140

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.