Tornadoes · United States · Utah · 2015
EF0 tornado, Dry Fork, Utah, June 16, 2015
This EF0 tornado ran 1.0 miles across Uintah County on June 16, 2015, touching down at 2:00 PM MDT and reaching 50 yards wide. It killed nobody.
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
- June 16, 2015
- Touchdown
- 2:00 PM MDT (20:00 UTC)
- Lifted
- 2:09 PM MDT (20:09 UTC)
- On the ground
- 9 minutes
- Path length
- 1.0 miles (1.6 km)
- Path width
- 50 yards (46 m)
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- County
- Uintah County
- Touchdown point
- 40.781, -109.354
- Lift-off point
- 40.775, -109.337
- Record number
- 1506161400-01
The damage survey
2 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS GJT, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF0. The highest wind the damage implies is 70 mph.
Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.
What the Weather Service recorded
A strong rotating thunderstorm produced damaging outflow winds in Daggett County and continued on into Uintah County where it produced a relatively long-lived but short track tornado.
The supercell thunderstorm which produced strong damaging outflow winds in Daggett County moved into nearby Uintah County and spawned a funnel cloud which was observed for well over 5 minutes before the rotation made contact with the ground. The tornado remained over open country during its existence. Although the rotation was on the ground for about 9 minutes, it was estimated to have only traveled about one mile during that time. After the rotation lifted off the ground, the funnel cloud persisted for at least another 5 minutes.
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) | Expired | Product | Office |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19:40 UTC | 20:15 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | GJT |
| 20:14 UTC | 20:30 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | GJT |
| 22:37 UTC | 01:30 UTC | Flood Advisory | GJT |
| 22:43 UTC | 23:15 UTC | Severe Thunderstorm Warning | GJT |
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 Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 19:46 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.
Grand Junction, CO (KGJT), 12:00Z
8.0 hours before the tornado, 197 km from the path. June 16, 2015.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 12 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- -220 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 197 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 2366 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 44 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 25 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 215 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 251 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 0.0
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 6.4 K/km
Grand Junction, CO (KGJT), 00:00Z
4.0 hours after it, 197 km from the path. June 17, 2015.
- Mixed-layer CAPE
- 0 J/kg
- Mixed-layer CIN
- 0 J/kg
- Surface CAPE
- 1779 J/kg
- Mixed-layer LCL
- 0 m above ground
- 0-6 km bulk shear
- 32 kt
- 0-1 km bulk shear
- 13 kt
- 0-1 km storm-relative helicity
- 63 m²/s²
- 0-3 km storm-relative helicity
- 139 m²/s²
- Significant tornado parameter
- 0.0
- Supercell composite
- 2.7
- 0-3 km lapse rate
- 9.6 K/km
The radar
The Grand Junction radar (KGJX), 214 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:01 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19:55 UTC | FUNNEL CLOUD | 10 Ssw Jarvie Ranch | Uintah, UT | |
| 20:10 UTC | TORNADO | 12 Ssw Jarvie Ranch | Uintah, UT | |
| 20:15 UTC | TSTM WND DMG | 10 S Jarvie Ranch | Uintah, UT | LARGE PINE AND ASPEN TREES SNAPPED NEAR BASE OF TREES AND SMALLER PINE TREES UPROOTED |
From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.
This ground now
The live radar over the trackEvery 2015 tornado in UtahEvery tornado in Utah since 1950Warnings in force in Utah nowThe forecast where you are
The other tornadoes of June 16, 2015
1 more were confirmed in the United States that day.
| Date | Time | Rating | Where | Path (mi) | Width (yd) | Deaths | Injuries | Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 16 | 3:03 PM MDT | EF0 | Converse, WY | 1.0 | 35 |
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.