Tornadoes · United States · Texas · 2020

EF0 tornado, Pasadena to Golden Acres, Texas, May 27, 2020

Name: EF0 tornado, Pasadena to Golden Acres, Texas, May 27, 2020
Start: 2020-05-27T21:50:00.000Z
End: 2020-05-27T21:53:00.000Z
Location: Pasadena to Golden Acres, Texas

From Pasadena to Golden Acres, this EF0 tornado ran 1.8 miles across Harris County on May 27, 2020, touching down at 4:50 PM CDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $30,000 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.

EF065 to 85 mphthis tornado
Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.
EF186 to 110 mph
Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.
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.
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.
EF4166 to 200 mph
Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.
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.
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: May 27, 2020
Touchdown: 4:50 PM CDT (21:50 UTC)
Lifted: 4:53 PM CDT (21:53 UTC)
On the ground: 3 minutes
Path length: 1.8 miles (2.8 km)
Path width: 50 yards (46 m)
Deaths: 0
Injuries: 0
Property damage: $30,000
County: Harris County
Touchdown point: 29.705, -95.187
Lift-off point: 29.692, -95.162
Record number: 2005271550-01

What the Weather Service recorded

Severe thunderstorms developed and produce wind damage, hail and few tornadoes.

Damage along short NW to SE track parallel to Red Bluff Road. Eyewitness saw tornado. Numerous trees down. Damage to fences, carports.

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

The warnings

0 minutes of warning. NWS HGX issued a tornado warning for this county at 21:50 UTC, 0 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 22:03 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 18:28 UTC and running to 01:58 UTC.

Issued (UTC)	Expired	Product	Office
18:28 UTC	01:58 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Watch	HGX
20:08 UTC	21:00 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	HGX
20:21 UTC	20:45 UTC	Tornado Warning	HGX
20:54 UTC	21:30 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	HGX
21:06 UTC	21:30 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	HGX
21:28 UTC	22:30 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	HGX
21:45 UTC	23:45 UTC	Flood Advisory	HGX
21:50 UTC	22:03 UTC	Tornado Warning	HGX
22:06 UTC	23:00 UTC	Severe Thunderstorm Warning	HGX
22:28 UTC	00:23 UTC	Flood Advisory	HGX

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 19:54 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.

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

9.8 hours before the tornado, 196 km from the path. May 27, 2020.

Skew-T log-p

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.

Hodograph

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: 827 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -60 J/kg
Surface CAPE: 614 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 1257 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 32 kt
0-1 km bulk shear: 12 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 31 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 84 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.0
Supercell composite: 0.4
0-3 km lapse rate: 5.0 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

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

2.2 hours after it, 196 km from the path. May 28, 2020.

Skew-T log-p

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.

Hodograph

Mixed-layer CAPE: 104 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN: -122 J/kg
Surface CAPE: 89 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL: 1478 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear: 12 kt
0-1 km bulk shear: 21 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity: 119 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity: 222 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter: 0.0
Supercell composite: 0.1
0-3 km lapse rate: 5.7 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The radar

The Houston radar (KHGX), 27 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 21:48 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.

What was reported nearby

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

Time (UTC)	Report	Where	County	Remark
19:59 UTC	FUNNEL CLOUD	3 Ne Santa Fe	Galveston, TX	FUNNEL CLOUD WAS SIGHTED.
21:07 UTC	TSTM WND GST 60	2 S Oak Ridge North	Montgomery, TX	STRONG WINDS BENDING TREES WITH SOME TREES DOWN IN THE WOODLANDS AREA.
21:15 UTC	TSTM WND GST 60	Jersey Village	Harris, TX	WIND GUST WAS ESTIMATED IN THE JERSEY VILLAGE AREA.
21:20 UTC	TSTM WND GST 70	3 N Spring	Montgomery, TX	STRONG WIND GUSTS HAVE DOWNED TREES IN THE SPRING AREA.
21:21 UTC	TSTM WND GST 59	5 W Humble	Harris, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT KIAH ASOS.
21:36 UTC	TSTM WND GST 65	1 Se Houston	Harris, TX	CORRECTS PREVIOUS TSTM WND GST REPORT FROM 1 SE HOUSTON. WIND GUST WAS NEAR DOWNTOWN HOUSTON. SOME TREES WERE DOWNED.
21:41 UTC	TSTM WND DMG	1 N Channelview	Harris, TX	TREES WERE DOWNED IN THE CHANNELVIEW AREA.
21:46 UTC	TSTM WND GST 65	1 Se Houston	Harris, TX	WIND GUST WAS NEAR DOWNTOWN HOUSTON.
21:55 UTC	TSTM WND DMG	Deer Park	Harris, TX	NUMEROUS REPORTS OF HOME AND PROPERTY DAMAGE ALONG WITH DOWNED TREES IN AND AROUND THE DEER PARK AREA. POSSIBLE TORNADO.
21:55 UTC	TSTM WND DMG	Pasadena	Harris, TX	CORRECTS PREVIOUS MARINE TSTM WIND REPORT FROM PASADENA. NUMEROUS REPORTS OF HOME AND PROPERTY DAMAGE ALONG WITH DOWNED TREES IN AND AROUND THE PASADENA AREA. POSSIBLE TORNADO.
21:55 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 60	Pasadena	Harris, TX	NUMEROUS REPORTS OF HOME AND PROPERTY DAMAGE ALONG WITH DOWNED TREES IN AND AROUND THE PASADENA AREA. POSSIBLE TORNADO.
22:25 UTC	TSTM WND DMG	4 Ese Texas City	Galveston, TX	ROOF DAMAGE TO A TEXAS CITY BUSINESS.
22:30 UTC	TSTM WND DMG	3 E Texas City	Galveston, TX	LARGE TREE LIMBS AND SOME FENCING WERE BLOWN DOWN.
22:30 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 59	4 Ene Texas City	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE TEXAS CITY WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:33 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 49	19 E San Leon	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE CRAB LAKE WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:38 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 69	19 E San Leon	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE CRAB LAKE WEATHERFLOW SITE. SUSTAINED WIND WAS 54 MPH.
22:40 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 41	4 Ene Texas City	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE TEXAS CITY LEVEE WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:42 UTC	TSTM WND GST 70	3 Ne Galveston	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT SCHOLES FIELD AIRPORT ASOS.
22:43 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 39	11 Ene Bayou Vista	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE PORT BOLIVAR WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:45 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 71	5 Nne Galveston	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE HARBORSIDE WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:47 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 42	Jamaica Beach	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT JAMAICA BEACH.
22:48 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 52	3 Wsw Galveston	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE LAFITTE COVE WEATHERFLOW SITE.
22:53 UTC	MARINE TSTM WIND 47	19 E San Leon	Galveston, TX	WIND GUST WAS MEASURED AT THE CRAB LAKE WEATHERFLOW SITE.

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

This ground now

The live radar over the track Every 2020 tornado in Texas Every tornado in Texas since 1950 Warnings in force in Texas now The forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 27, 2020

4 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

Date	Time	Rating	Where	Path (mi)	Width (yd)	Damage
May 27	3:21 PM CDT	EF1	Waller, TX	0.8	50
May 27	3:23 PM CDT	EF1	Waller, TX	1.4	75
May 27	7:08 PM EDT	EF0	Warren, NC	0.2	150	$50,000
May 27	7:34 PM CDT	Unrated	Clinton, IL	0.1	10

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.