OSCEOLA COUNTY, Fla. – The National Weather Service confirmed a tornado touched down Monday in northern rural Osceola County during an intense round of storms.
The tornado touched down at approximately 7:15 p.m. along the southern side of Lake Joel in St. Cloud, near Sungrove Lane and the C-32 Canal.
The tornado moved east over a densely wooded area before lifting around 7:23 p.m. just west of Storey Bend Road.
There were no immediate reports of damage.
The NWS said they cannot provide an EF rating at this time due to limited access to the area.
Wind detection shows the tornado vortex signature, the area where the rotation is being detected on radar. This is where the red and green colors are tight together.
The red represents rain being blown away from the radar while the green is toward the radar.
Radar can also detect differences between rain drops, hail, bugs and debris. The lightening of the color near Nova road is debris being picked up by the tornado.
This debris can be anything from dirt to twigs to trees.
The environment was not primed for tornadoes, however, the colliding east and west coast sea breezes were intersecting with an outflow boundary or rain-cooled air from a thunderstorm.
This provided just enough spin to produce the brief tornado.
This serves as a reminder that routine afternoon storms can turn severe quickly when the sea breeze is involved.