Tornadoes · United States · Wisconsin · 1996

F2 tornado, Stratford, Wisconsin, August 7, 1996

This F2 tornado ran 2.5 miles across Marathon County on August 7, 1996, touching down at 2:45 AM CDT and reaching 200 yards wide. It killed nobody, and did $200,000 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 7, 1996
Touchdown
2:45 AM CDT (07:45 UTC)
Path length
2.5 miles (4.0 km)
Path width
200 yards (183 m)
Deaths
0
Injuries
0
Property damage
$200,000
County
Marathon County
Touchdown point
45.070, -90.070
Lift-off point
44.900, -90.030
Record number
682

What the Weather Service recorded

A tornado touched down 6.5 miles north of Stratford, tore the top portion of a home off, flattened a garage and snapped off several large trees. The storm moved east-northeast for 2.5 miles, damaging a storage shed and 30 trees on a farm. Dozens of Ginseng shelters were thrown about. The tornado was not on the ground for the entire path.

A tornado touched down 1 mile north of Stratford. The tornado snapped off numerous large trees, some of which fell on top of homes. In addition, a barn was flattened, semi-trailer flipped over and a car moved 75 feet.

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. One was issued for the county at another hour that day.

Issued (UTC)ExpiredProductOffice
06:54 UTC08:10 UTCSevere Thunderstorm WarningGRB
07:54 UTC08:40 UTCTornado WarningGRB

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. The outlook in force was issued at 05:55 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.

Green Bay/Straub, WI (KGRB), 00:00Z

7.8 hours before the tornado, 164 km from the path. August 7, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Green Bay/Straub, WI at 00:00Z on 1996-08-07Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 3575 joules per kilogram, CIN -4, lifted condensation level 778 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, Green Bay/Straub, WI at 00:00Z on 1996-08-07The 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 113 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 15 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
3575 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-4 J/kg
Surface CAPE
3877 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
778 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
15 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
18 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
113 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
133 m²/s²
Significant tornado parameter
0.0
Supercell composite
0.0
0-3 km lapse rate
6.1 K/km

Open this sounding in Storm Lab

Green Bay/Straub, WI (KGRB), 12:00Z

4.2 hours after it, 164 km from the path. August 7, 1996.

Skew-T log-pSkew-T log-p diagram, Green Bay/Straub, WI at 12:00Z on 1996-08-07Temperature and dew point through the depth of the atmosphere, with the mixed-layer parcel lifted from the surface. Mixed-layer CAPE 14 joules per kilogram, CIN -313, lifted condensation level 1201 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, Green Bay/Straub, WI at 12:00Z on 1996-08-07The 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 -89 square meters per square second, 0 to 6 km bulk shear 40 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
14 J/kg
Mixed-layer CIN
-313 J/kg
Surface CAPE
142 J/kg
Mixed-layer LCL
1201 m above ground
0-6 km bulk shear
40 kt
0-1 km bulk shear
40 kt
0-1 km storm-relative helicity
-89 m²/s²
0-3 km storm-relative helicity
-56 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 surface observations

Wausau (AUW), 34 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

Time (UTC)Temp (°F)Dew point (°F)WindGust (kt)Pressure (mb)Weather
05:51 UTC80.675.2160° 10 kt1012.5BR
06:24 UTC180° 11 kt171011.9
06:50 UTC80.675.2190° 10 kt181011.2BR
07:50 UTC78.875.2180° 11 kt201009.5TS BR
08:14 UTC280° 22 kt321011.9
08:29 UTC290° 11 kt201012.9
08:39 UTC280° 12 kt211012.9
08:53 UTC6866.2310° 9 kt171012.9-TSRA
09:39 UTC170° 6 kt1013.9

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

The radar

The La Crosse radar (KARX), 158 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 07:42 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.

This ground now

The live radar over the trackEvery 1996 tornado in WisconsinEvery tornado in Wisconsin since 1950Warnings in force in Wisconsin nowThe forecast where you are

The other tornadoes of August 7, 1996

2 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

DateTimeRatingWherePath (mi)Width (yd)DeathsInjuriesDamage
August 72:46 AM CDTF1Marathon, WI0.2100$100,000
August 73:19 AM CDTF1Marathon, WI0.4100$90,000

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.