LivLuvAndBootlegMusic said:
Here's the meteorology nerd in me coming out - I remember this tornado very well. I remember that one guy...Josh something?....getting the record windspeed. I think it was 318mph, which happens to be the max. limit for an F5 tornado. Personally, I would consider the tornado an F6 based on that windspeed. If he recorded 318 mph, you can bet it was going even 1mph faster at some point during its life, which bumps it up to F6. The F0-F5 ratings do have corrosponding wind speeds, ground speeds, etc, but the rating is (or is supposed to be, according to Fujita, the "F") given based on the damage alone. F6s and above I guess then would be classified based on the windspeed and the other factors, since the damage scale of an F5 is that everything is completely scattered and destroyed.
Yeah, I've heard various things about that high wind speed, too.
318 mile an hour winds...
. Good god, I can't even begin to imagine...
Orignally posted by LivLuvAndBootlegMusic
We had a tornado (F2, 120mph winds) just a few miles north of where I've been vacationing for the past two weeks. Last week, there was this HUGE storm during the night. Lots of blackouts and brownouts w/ the electricity. We didn't realise until yesterday that there had been a tornado. I'm not sure if there were any eyewitnesses that could prove it was a tornado (as opposed to strong winds or a microburst), but we went to look at the damage and there is a definite NE path where HUGE trees were blown over, the tell-tale sign of the tornado being that about halfway down the trees, the trees are completely twisted and broken in half. Luckily, the path was only a few miles long and moved through the woods so the only major damage was trees and having to clear the roads and the river.
...wow. That's scary. Glad that your area didn't get hit
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We had a storm in Iowa back in...1998, I believe it was, in which one of the windows in our house (the living room, specifically) was blown in, and the next day we saw that there were branches all over the road and trees pulled out by their roots (a couple of which were also hanging about in the road), and a couple of trees in front of our house were either bent over or split down the middle, and other people's windows in our neighborhood were broken, and I think there were a few other things scattered about in the roads. They officially said it was straight-line winds, but my dad thinks perhaps a small tornado may have come through...what do you think?
Also, apparently there was a storm just a bit north of here last night that apparently had 60 to 80 mph winds, there was a microburst that apparently came through that area-destroyed a storage shed, and did a bit of damage to a few other things. They'd investigated to see if a small tornado was involved there, too, but have since said there wasn't one.
And I'll agree with verte, I hope those people are able to get back home soon, too. And those of you who've been through all these hurricanes and tropical storms the past year or so-god, you poor people. Last August and September were just insane as far as that kind of thing went. And this season's been pretty busy for you guys, too. Hopefully, even though we're getting closer to the peak of the hurricane season, it'll stay pretty calm for your area so you guys can finally go back to normal. I remember around Christmastime last year reading a story on Yahoo! about families who were homeless as a result of the hurricanes, and whose homes still weren't fully rebuilt, and how it didn't feel at all like Christmas for them. I felt so horrible for them, it was such a sad story
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Angela