Biggest Summer Tornado Outbreaks Since 1950

Although tornadoes can and do occur here during Summer, they do not happen as frequently and tend to be weaker than those in Spring.  This is mainly due to the fact that temperature gradients are less intense during Summer and thus the jet stream tends to be weaker and farther north.  This lack of stronger winds aloft is detrimental to the production of strong tornadoes, but they can still occur when conditions come together just right.

I have scanned the tornado database back to 1950 in order to establish our biggest summertime tornado outbreaks.  Here are some of the biggest outbreaks between the Summer Solstice and Autumn Equinox (roughly June 21-September 22).


June 26, 1973:  10 tornadoes struck the state, 9 of which occurred in central/southern Indiana.  The strongest was a F2 near Bloomington.

July 30, 1992:  6 tornadoes occurred, including an F2 in Morgan county and a F3 in Johnson county.  The Johnson county tornado had a path length of about 7 miles and injured 25 people.

September 20, 2002:  6 tornadoes happened with 4 of them rated F2 or higher.  The highlight of this event was the long track F3 tornado that started near Ellettsville and ended near Hartford City in Blackford county.  This impressive tornado had a path length of 112 miles, injured over 100 people and caused more than $100 million damage.    For more on this event, click here

June 23, 2010:  6 tornadoes occurred in northern Indiana, mostly in Elkhart county.  These tornadoes were spawned from a quasi-linear convective system which moved across the area.

August 9, 1969:  5 tornadoes occurred, the most significant being an early morning F3 in Indianapolis which injured 6 people.

September 19, 1988:  5 weak tornadoes struck various parts of the state, injuring 3 people.

July 26, 2005:  5 tornadoes occurred, including a F2 in Cass and Miami counties.  Nobody was injured.

June 27, 2008:  5 brief EF0 tornadoes occurred, one of which injured 2 people in Morgan county.


Special mention:  On July 9, 1980, a F4 tornado struck Rush county, killing 2 people.  Although there was only one other tornado on this date (a weak F0 near Crawfordsville), this event is significant because it is the only known F4 tornado to hit Indiana during the summer.