Miami Tornado

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The Miami Tornado was a tornado event that occurred on May 12, 1997. The tornado was at the high end of the F1 category on the Fujita scale, with winds of about 100 mph.

The tornado is remembered not for its minor damage but for its haunting pictures, which made headlines around the world. In many photographs, the tornado is seen weaving in and out of the skyscrapers of downtown Miami.

The tornado formed in the afternoon (around 2:00 PM), initially touching down in the Silver Bluff Estates area. It crossed the two bridges going to Key Biscayne, sideswiping a cruise ship. The tornado lifted from the water halfway through Biscayne Bay and touched down briefly again on the island of Miami Beach, flipping over a car and soon dissipating. The Storm Prediction Center in Oklahoma had predicted tornadoes in the area and warned that there might be more to come.

While hurricanes are often seen as the biggest weather threat to Miami, tornadoes are relatively common in South Florida, although the vast majority of the tornadoes that strike Miami-Dade County are small, relatively weak F0 or F1 tornadoes. Most of these tornadoes form as either waterspouts off of Biscayne Bay, as part of the frequent afternoon thunderstorms, or spawned from a Tropical Storm or Hurricane. Tornadoes can and have occurred in every month of the year in Miami-Dade County.