With it being a VERY active tornado season, many people are hearing for the first time about the "Enhanced Fujita Scale".

First, let me begin by telling you about the old Fujita scale. This was the scale that the National Weather Service would use to estimate wind speeds contained in a tornado, based on damage. The scale went from F0 (the weakest tornado) to F5 (the strongest).

To improve accuracy of these estimates, the Enhanced Fujita Scale was born. Much like the original, it goes from 0 (the weakest) to 5 the Strongest. Now, however, this scale uses many more variables (damage survey) to estimate the wind speeds.

So in, short, the Enhanced Fujita (EF Scale), is an improved version of the old Fujita Scale.

To find out more about this scale go to the following websites:

http://www.spc.noaa.gov/faq/tornado/ef-scale.html
http://www.spc.noaa.gov/efscale/

Ray Petelin,
WSEE Storm Team Meteorologist