Map Of May 25 Tornadoes

Map Of April 19-20 Tornadoes

Map Of February 28 Tornadoes

I will be posting maps of our significant 2011 tornado outbreaks in the next several days.  Kicking things off, here is the February 28 outbreak:

Biggest Winter Tornado Outbreaks Since 1950

Here are some of our biggest tornado outbreaks between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox (roughly December 22-March 21).


February 25, 1956:  9 tornadoes struck central and southern Indiana, injuring 4 people.

March 6, 1956:  7 tornadoes struck northern Indiana with an additional tornado in southern Indiana.  1 person was killed and 35 were injured, mostly in Grant county where a F4 occurred.
 
February 10, 1959:  5 tornadoes hit central and southern Indiana, the strongest being F3 in Knox county.

March 6, 1961:  10 tornadoes occurred, injuring 8 people.

March 19, 1963:  4 tornadoes occurred with 3 of them being F2.  2 people were killed in Washington county.

March 12, 1976:  13 tornadoes struck mainly the northern half of the state, resulting in 2 fatalities and over 40 injuries.  This is the biggest winter tornado outbreak on record.

March 20, 1976:  Occurring barely a week after the March 12 outbreak, this event produced 8 tornadoes including a F4 in Tippecanoe county which tracked into Carroll county.  18 people were injured in all.

March 10, 1986:  8 tornadoes occurred, injuring 48 people.  Also, 1 person was killed in Hancock county.

January 7, 1989:  3 tornadoes struck southern Indiana, injuring 5 people.  One of them, rated F4, crossed from Illinois into Knox county.
 
January 29, 2008:  5 tornadoes touched down making it our biggest January tornado outbreak on record.
3 people were killed in 2 separate tornadoes, one of which affected parts of Knox/Gibson counties and the other in Clark county.

March 8, 2009:  5 tornadoes occurred including an EF3 in Lawrence county which caused 1 injury.

F/EF Scale Ratings By Time Of Day

Below is a graph showing tornado ratings by time of day for tornadoes from 1950-2010.  I've broken it down into six 4 hour time intervals for simplicity.  The graph is fairly self explanatory but there are a few things worth mentioning.  I decided to use Z time since Indiana lies in 2 time zones.  Secondly, this graph is only as accurate as the times given in the NCDC/SPC databases.  Thirdly, some tornadoes were not rated especially prior to the 1970's.  Those tornadoes are shown as "F?"  Finally, each tornado was grouped based on the START time of the tornado.  For example, a tornado starting at 1750z and ending at 1815z would be classified in the 1400z-1759z timeframe.





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Here are the same data as above in text form:


0200z-0559z:

F?:  6
F0/F1:  95
F2/F3:  64
F4/F5:  4

0600z-0959z:

F?:  0
F0/F1:  24
F2/F3:  28
F4/F5:  0

1000z-1359z:

F?:  3
F0/F1:  33
F2/F3:  19
F4/F5:  0

1400-1759z:

F?:  1
F0/F1:  63
F2/F3:  10
F4/F5:  0

1800z-2159z:

F?:  11
F0/F1:  223
F2/F3:  105
F4/F5:  13

2200z-0159z:

F?:  19
F0/F1:  370
F2/F3:  130
F4/F5:  15

2011 Tornado Map

Here is a map of our 2011 tornadoes, drawn to the best of my ability.

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December Tornadoes Per County Since 1950