EF1 tornado, Oxford to Glenoak, Wisconsin, August 28, 2018

1. EF065 to 85 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. 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.

4. 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.

5. EF4166 to 200 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. 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.

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.

Rating

EF1

Date

August 28, 2018

Touchdown

3:03 PM CDT (20:03 UTC)

Lifted

3:06 PM CDT (20:06 UTC)

On the ground

3 minutes

Path length

1.8 miles (2.9 km)

Path width

75 yards (69 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

County

Marquette County

Touchdown point

43.753, -89.428

Lift-off point

43.747, -89.393

Record number

1808281403-01

47 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS ARX and NWS MKX, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 105 mph.

• laying down to see. on small house near cemetery.
• Tree laying in same direction as other tree located approximately 40 yards away.
• small twist to tree snapped
• Multiple trees snapped. Power lines down. Convergent damage path...narrow.

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

A line of severe thunderstorms produced widespread wind damage and 18 brief tornadoes across mainly Marquette, Green Lake, Fond du Lac, northern Dodge, and Sheboygan Counties. Flash flooding and river flooding also occurred in several of these areas, especially the Baraboo River in northern Sauk County. The Baraboo River reached major to record flood stage late August into September after 10 to 12 inches of rain over the Baraboo River basin the last two weeks of August.

Tornado was 1 of 19 tornadoes that occurred across central to east central Wisconsin on the afternoon of August 28th. This tornado went just south of the Village of Oxford and crossed Fandrich St. Widespread straight line winds caused significant tree and crop damage across the county as well.

Tornado was 1 of 19 tornadoes that occurred across central to east central Wisconsin on the afternoon of August 28th. This tornado went just south of Buffalo Lake and crossed County Rd D. Multiple trees uprooted and topped. Widespread straight line winds caused significant tree and crop damage across the county as well.

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

17 minutes of warning. NWS MKX issued a tornado warning for this county at 19:46 UTC, 17 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 20:30 UTC.

The county was under a severe thunderstorm watch, issued at 18:15 UTC and running to 23:11 UTC.

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 Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Enhanced Risk, with a 0.02 chance of a tornado within 25 miles. The outlook in force was issued at 19:44 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 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.

Wautoma (Y50), 34 km from the path, in the two hours either side.

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

The Milwaukee radar (KMKX), 111 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the touchdown began at 20:00 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.

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

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

The live radar over the trackEvery 2018 tornado in WisconsinEvery tornado in Wisconsin since 1950Warnings in force in Wisconsin nowThe forecast where you are

25 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

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.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.