Florida Christmas Day Tornadoes / Shelf Cloud Photos

Good morning…

Christmas 2006 turned out to be a pretty stormy one in central Florida with several tornadoes producing F2 damage and causing injuries. Tornadic embedded super cells moved through central Florida during the early afternoon with the first damage being report coming in from Pasco County, were 15-20 homes had severe damage and area F2 damage for about a mile long.

New cells developed and quickly went tornadic just north of the Orlando area near De Land, Florida where another F2 damage path was reported by the National Weather Service in Melbourne, FL. There were 7 people injured, with 2 serious in a mobile home park, where severe damage as well was reported with the NWS survey late Christmas Day.

Another F2 damage path was reported by the NWS in the Daytona Beach area and more high wind reports across the Space Coast.

In north Florida near Lake City, another person was hurt during a tornado where 12 homes have impressive damage, with one being demolished.

I encountered a small embedded mesocyclone along the line when in eastern Okeechobee County that lasted a very short time. I went on to document the squall line and shelf cloud, as seen the photos above, along the Martin/Palm Beach county line. I observed 40-45 mph winds and some cool looking shelf structure being it was Christmas Day.

The squall line with some tornadic line segments in Central Florida from the Tampa area, northeastward to the De Land and then Daytona Beach area, look to be the main severe damaging weather for yesterday.

I might spend the afternoon up in central FL to survey some of the damage myself to document for my archives. I’ll keep you posted.

You can also read the full damage survey report for the Central Florida Tornado Christmas Day event from the National Weather Service Office in Melbourne, Florida. The report includes some radar and text data, along with damage survey photos from De Land and Daytona. (Read)

More later…