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EF0 tornado in Waukesha County, Wisconsin

Tornado April 17, 2026 · Waukesha County, Wisconsin

EF0
Rating
9.3 mi
Whole path
70 yd
Path width
$232K
Damage as recorded

NOAA records this tornado county by county. Its path ran through Waukesha County → Racine County → Racine County → Milwaukee County; the totals above are for the whole tornado.

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 70 yards (0.04 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What EF0 means. On the Enhanced Fujita scale, EF0 is light damage: shingles and siding peeled, gutters torn, branches broken, consistent with estimated gusts of 65–85 mph. The rating comes from a survey of the worst damage after the storm, not from a wind measurement, so it says as much about what the tornado hit as about how strong it was.

What the National Weather Service wrote

The tornado began over a farm field where a few small limbs were downed. The tornado continued to the northeast, snapping a few trees and downing several large limbs. Further to the northeast, the view was not accessible with the tornado ending southwest of Big Muskego Lake, south of the Big Muskego Lake Wildlife area.

The wider storm

A round of severe thunderstorms and flash flooding occurred as a strong cold front approached and tracked across southern WI. More specifically, supercell thunderstorms developed from northeast IA into southwest WI and far southern WI during the late afternoon and evening hours. Eventually these storms transitioned to a squall line which had a number of tornadoes associated with it, as it tracked through southeast Wisconsin. Flash flooding affected much of the same region especially in Janesville. Many large hail reports and a small number of downburst damaging wind reports were also received.

Began near Muskego Lake (42.8548, -88.1492).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

6 more tornadoes the National Weather Service filed under this storm episode.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 1329358. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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