Tornadoes · United States · West Virginia · 2001

F0 tornado, Wadeville, West Virginia, May 21, 2001

This F0 tornado ran 0.7 miles across Wood County on May 21, 2001, touching down at 8:10 PM EDT and reaching 100 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $180,000 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 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
May 21, 2001
Touchdown
8:10 PM EDT (00:10 UTC)
Path length
0.7 miles (1.1 km)
Path width
100 yards (91 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$180,000
County
Wood County
Touchdown point
39.120, -81.600
Lift-off point
39.120, -81.600
Record number
149

What the Weather Service recorded

An F0 tornado occurred across County Route 46 and the North Fork of Lee Creek. Two barns were damaged and a mobile home was destroyed.

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

What forecasters said that day

The local office's own words before the tornado touched down, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.

NWS Charleston, WV wrote its last area forecast discussion before the tornado touched down at May 21, 3:45 PM EDT, 4 hours 25 minutes earlier.

Area forecast discussion, May 21, 3:45 PM EDT, 4 hours 25 minutes before
AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE CHARLESTON WV
345 PM EDT MON MAY 21 2001

SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL THE FRONT MOVES
THROUGH ON TUESDAY. FLASH FLOOD GUIDANCE REMAINS LOW...SO WILL
CONTINUE FLASH FLOOD WATCH. MODELS LOOKS DRY TUESDAY NIGHT AND
WEDNESDAY BEHIND THE FRONT...BUT A BIT WORRIED ABOUT INSTABILITY
FROM SUCH A COLD AIR MASS MOVING IN. SINCE PREVIOUSLY HAD SHOWERS IN
ON WEDNESDAY...WILL LEAVE SPRINKLES INSTEAD.

.RLX...
WV...FLASH FLOOD WATCH FOR MONDAY NIGHT FOR ZONES WVZ005>011...
     WVZ013>020...WVZ024>040...WVZ046>047.
VA...FLASH FLOOD WATCH FOR MONDAY NIGHT FOR ZONES VAZ003>004.
KY...FLASH FLOOD WATCH FOR MONDAY NIGHT F$OR ZONES
     KYZ101>103...KYZ105.
OH...FLASH FLOOD WATCH FOR MONDAY NIGHT FOR ZONES
     OHZ066>067...OHZ075>076...OHZ083>087.

.END/RPY

In the hours before

Local storm report, May 21, 8:02 PM EDT, 8 minutes before
PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE CHARLESTON WEST VIRGINIA
0802 PM EDT MON MAY 21 2001

THE FOLLOWING REPORTS ARE UNOFFICIAL AND MAY HAVE BEEN COLLECTED
FROM UNTRAINED SOURCES

TIME(EDT)  .....CITY LOCATION..... STATE  ...EVENT/REMARKS...
           ....COUNTY LOCATION....

0800 PM    MINERAL WELLS             WV   FUNNEL CLOUD
05/21/01   WOOD                           EVENT OCCURRED BETWEEN
                     -                     0745 PM  AND  0800 PM

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.

Pittsburgh, PA (KPIT), 00:00Z

0.2 hours before the tornado, 192 km from the path. May 22, 2001.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Pittsburgh, PA at 00:00Z on 2001-05-22Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 0 joules per kilogram, CIN -80858, lifted condensation level 745 meters above ground. Wind barbs in knots down the right edge.LCL10008507005003002001001 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, Pittsburgh, PA at 00:00Z on 2001-05-22The 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 244 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 44 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
0 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-80858 J/kg
Surface CAPE
7 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
745 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
44 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
28 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
244 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
323 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.1
0-3 km lapse rate
4.5 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Pittsburgh, PA (KPIT), 12:00Z

11.8 hours after it, 192 km from the path. May 22, 2001.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Pittsburgh, PA at 12:00Z on 2001-05-22Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 8 joules per kilogram, CIN -16, lifted condensation level 627 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, Pittsburgh, PA at 12:00Z on 2001-05-22The 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 55 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 20 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
8 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-16 J/kg
Surface CAPE
5 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
627 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
20 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
14 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
55 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
70 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
4.3 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

The surface observations

Parkersburg (PKB), 28 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
00:00 UTC

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

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 2001 tornado in West VirginiaEvery tornado in West Virginia since 1950Warnings in force in West Virginia nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of May 21, 2001

25 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
May 211:23 PM EDTF0Oakland, MI1.0150$70,000
May 212:15 PM EDTF0Eaton, MI6.050$300,000
May 212:20 PM EDTF2Kalamazoo, MI1.0150$500,000
May 212:34 PM EDTF2Livingston, MI10.92003$3.0 million
May 212:35 PM EDTF0Kent, MI0.650$100,000
May 212:35 PM EDTF0Ottawa, MI0.150$50,000
May 212:50 PM EDTF0Barry, MI1.050$200,000
May 212:52 PM EDTF0Allegan, MI1.550$50,000
May 212:55 PM EDTF1Clinton, MI4.550$300,000
May 213:00 PM EDTF0Shiawassee, MI0.130
May 213:29 PM EDTF1Kent, MI0.350$200,000
May 213:30 PM EDTF0Ionia, MI1.050$100,000
May 213:40 PM EDTF0Kent, MI0.150$50,000
May 213:50 PM EDTF0Kent, MI0.150$70,000
May 214:20 PM EDTF1Gratiot, MI3.0401$150,000
May 214:40 PM EDTF0Gratiot, MI2.550$30,000
May 214:40 PM EDTF1Isabella, MI4.0401$150,000
May 215:02 PM EDTF0Genesee, MI7.3100$140,000
May 215:25 PM EDTF2Medina, OH7.580$1.0 million
May 215:30 PM EDTF0Clare, MI0.130$10,000
May 216:05 PM EDTF0City of Suffolk, VA0.225$30,000
May 216:35 PM EDTF1Meigs, OH4.0200$400,000
May 217:43 PM EDTF1Stark, OH0.51001$450,000
May 219:15 PM CDTF1Hidalgo, TX0.175$30,000
May 219:25 PM CDTF1Hidalgo, TX0.275$70,000

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.