F2 Tornado — Allen, Indiana

2001-05-26 · near Ft Wayne, Allen, Indiana

Event narrative

Tornado touched down as as F1 at the Northcrest shopping mall on the northwest sideof Fort Wayne. Damaged to mall and surrounding businesses. Cars flipped over in parking lot withone person injured. Tornado then briefly lifted and touched down one half mile to the northeastas an F2. Extensive damage to the Papermill subdivision with F2 damage to two homes, anoffice complex, a retirement home, and a steeple torn off a church. One injury at the retirement home and one in the subdivision. Tornado proceeded northeast with F0-F1 damage to the Concordia Seminary and adjacent structures before the tornado lifted on the northeast side of the Seminary grounds.

Wider weather episode

Synoptic and mesoscale conditions and event summary for Saturday May 26th, 2001A low topped supercell thunderstorm developed in Cass county Indiana, and moved northeast through the Fort Wayne metropolitan area and into northwest Ohio. This thunderstorm produced several tornadoes and numerous funnel clouds. The wind field was favorable for rotating storms on with strong veering in the KIWX Wind Profile. This was on the south side of a unseasonably cold closed upper low in the mid and upper levels. Surface temperatures in the lower 50s, and scattered showers were against strong thunderstorm development. However sunshine over central Indiana allowed enough heating for a thunderstorm to develop and quickly began rotating.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (41.0667, -85.1333)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 5243006. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.