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F3 tornado in Orange County, Florida

Tornado February 22, 1998 – February 23, 1998 · Orange County, Florida

Rating

18.0 mi

Whole path

200 yd

Path width

Deaths

Injuries

$15.0M

Damage as recorded

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

EF0EF1EF2EF3EF4EF5Unrated

The path drawn at its surveyed width of 200 yards (0.11 mi) — zoom in and the swath grows to true scale. Other tornadoes recorded nearby that day are shown faint.

What F3 means. This tornado was rated on Fujita’s original scale, used until 2007. F3 meant severe damage: whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned; the scale paired it with winds of 158–206 mph, figures later judged too high, especially toward the top of the scale, and revised downward in the Enhanced Fujita scale. Ratings then, as now, came from the damage.

What the National Weather Service wrote

The Lake County tornado moved into Orange County about 5 miles southwest of Winter Garden moving northeast at 45 mph. It rapidly intensified to a category F3 tornado with estimated winds near 200 mph. The tornado moved through Winter Garden between 11:47 pm and 11:55 pm destroying a mobile home community in Winter Garden. There were three fatalities and 70 injuries. Five hundred structures were either damaged or destroyed.

Began near Winter Garden (28.5200, -81.6300).

Other tornadoes from the same storm system

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

F3 Kissimmee Tornado (1998) 25 dead F3 Seminole County 13 dead F2 Volusia County 1 dead F2 Volusia County F1 Brevard County F1 Brevard County

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event 5643841. Narratives are written by the National Weather Service forecast office that issued the report.

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