Tornadoes · United States · Virginia · 1983

F2 tornado, Richmond County, Virginia, August 31, 1983

This F2 tornado ran 0.2 miles across Richmond County on August 31, 1983, touching down at 6:00 PM EDT and reaching 60 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $5,000 to $50,000 of property damage.

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 mph

    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 mphthis tornado

    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
F2
Date
August 31, 1983
Touchdown
6:00 PM EDT (22:00 UTC)
Path length
0.2 miles (0.3 km)
Path width
60 yards (55 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$5,000 to $50,000
County
Richmond County
Touchdown point
37.970, -76.770
Record number
792

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.

Wallops Is Stn, VA (KWAL), 12:00Z

10.0 hours before the tornado, 120 km from the path. August 31, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Wallops Is Stn, VA at 12:00Z on 1983-08-31Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 33 joules per kilogram, CIN -111, lifted condensation level 1237 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, Wallops Is Stn, VA at 12:00Z on 1983-08-31The 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 20 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 14 knots.1939Sfc1 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
33 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-111 J/kg
Surface CAPE
95 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1237 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
14 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
4 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
20 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
11 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
5.2 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Wallops Is Stn, VA (KWAL), 00:00Z

2.0 hours after it, 120 km from the path. September 1, 1983.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Wallops Is Stn, VA at 00:00Z on 1983-09-01Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 213 joules per kilogram, CIN -82, lifted condensation level 1368 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, Wallops Is Stn, VA at 00:00Z on 1983-09-01The 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 1 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 29 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
213 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-82 J/kg
Surface CAPE
1519 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1368 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
29 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
4 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
1 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-9 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
6.6 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Patuxent River Nas (NHK), 47 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
20:00 UTC8673140° 12 kt1010.2DZ
20:39 UTC150° 10 kt1009.5DZ
21:00 UTC8272130° 10 kt1009.1DZ
22:00 UTC7569310° 6 kt1013.2-TSRA
22:20 UTC60° 4 kt1012.2SHRA
22:43 UTC90° 2 kt1012.2-SHRA FG
23:00 UTC716690° 2 kt1012.2-SHRA FG
23:21 UTC110° 5 kt1012.2-SHRA FG
23:45 UTC110° 6 kt1012.2-SHRA FG

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1983 tornado in VirginiaEvery tornado in Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in Virginia 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.