The El Reno tornado that killed 4 storm chasers (RIP) was 2.6 miles wide (wider than Manhattan!),with multiple vortices around the main funnel,packing the strongest winds. The entire thing was rain wrapped (concealed),making it incredibly difficult to identify with the naked eye.
Something wild that's been discovered just in the last couple of decades is that multiple vortices is actually more the norm than the exception, even with smaller tornadoes. Most of the time, they're there, but they haven't condensed, so they're invisible. Either way, wedges are definitely the scariest, simply from the sheer size the damage paths can be.
The only I can say comes close is when I was in Jamaica as a child and we were hit by a hurricane. The whole country was covered by it, the screaming winds sounded like a freight train and the concrete walls groaned, tree bark stripped off on many trees across the country. Rooves gone, parts of communities sliding down the mountains. And lightning of every colour but black and so frequent and bright that without a clock you can't tell if it's midnight or high noon.
I'll never forget hearing a caller call in saying he saw lights moving around in the woods behind his house. It took him a while to realise they were the headlights of cars being tossed by a massive cone tornado.
I was in El Reno during the 2013 tornado my uncle lived there and we were helping him with clean up of a few of his rent properties in Moore from that tornado. We were outside watching it, thinking it was just a wall cloud because it was so big (when you live in Oklahoma you get pretty used to tornadoes) but a storm chaser drove by and told us that it was already on the ground and that it was the biggest and fastest tornado he’d ever seen and he thought there was a chance in could turn towards us. So at that point we decided it was probably time to go into the shelter. I’m still in awe of the size and power of that tornado
@patriotenfield3276 Yes, it was deadlier, but only by 1 fatality. The 2013 El Reno tornado stayed mostly over open land. The NWS survey teams focus on the property damage to give it's rating, and because of that it was given an EF3 rating. Storm Chasers to this day say that the tornado should have been given an EF5 rating. The 2011 El Reno tornado had max winds of 151 mph. The 2013 El Reno tornado had max winds at 302 mph, the second highest ever recorded. The 2013 El Reno is the largest tornado ever recorded in history, but it's wind speed is still lower than the 1999 Bridge Creek-Moore which was measured at 318 mph. So yes, the 2011 El Reno was and EF5, the 2013 was an EF3 (because it had weakened by the time it hit property), the 2011 tornado still pales in comparison to the 2013 tornado.
I was in the 1979 Wichita Falls, Tx tornado. It was a wedge, and that’s my exact reaction. The sirens were going off and I saw people in the street pointing at something. When I stepped outside I saw it. I thought, “Oh God. Please tell me that’s rain.” Because it looked like an intense, localized downpour. When I saw the debris spinning around in it I went in, grabbed my little brother, and threw my mom’s mattress over us.
My grandpa passed from that tornado. They say its probably even higher than f5 if there was a category. At my grandma's funeral in 2017 they still talked about it
@@bananabreadloaf I’m not sure what the casualty count was, but there’s a reason houses in tornado alley have basements. A tornado will sweep a house away and leave the basement intact. As long as you’re underground, you’ll be okay.
@@techi9818That's not always true. Many homes are on a crawlspace or slab in these areas. Sometimes because the water table or soil type won't allow for a basement. Also let's not forget about our friends in the trailer parks.
@@MermaidMakes I'm a combat medic veteran and a doctor. I've seen more hell than most people see in a very long life. Nope. It's not easy. Nothing in life is. I have a punching bag that helps. And racquetball is the best anger management around. Thank you
@@kdallas3966 thank you for your service. I respect you so much for everything you’ve done!! I have C-ptsd though mine is from childhood trauma, but I have also seen things I would not wish on anyone. Exercise is an excellent way to unload all the anger and frustration from what we’ve been through. I should really get a punching bag. Haha.
I live in an active area. You get to a point where you know whats coming - the color of the sky, the shape of the clouds, the "green lightning" effect, the blast of the approaching outflow boundary, the hail, the sideways stinging rain. And then there comes those terrible few moments when you realize that seconds are precious commodities and your next decisions will define your life expectancy. Serious stuff.
Like literal green lightning? I ask because I was in a tornadic storm in 1985. The lightning was constant. It alternated between red and white, with several green flashes included. It was an epileptic's nightmare.
@@dianefarley37 I've only ever seen a greenish tint in my own experiences, but I wouldn't doubt that there could be other atmospheric conditions that might lead to different observations. Lots of high energy interactions going on in these events, after all. My own experiences have all taken place in the same general region, and always under very similar initial conditions, so others in different areas may well see things that I don't see. I'd love to know if that could be the case! But yes, the green tint has been markedly visible in my personal experiences, to answer your question.
out of curiosity, why would you choose to live in an area that gets frequent tornados? i’ve always thought of that as like tempting fate or something, never understood it
@@ghostsuru8429 Definitely not fake, I don't know where you live, but we do get the odd tornado in Ireland. My house was hit by one 1/Jan/2004, it knocked down some extremely heavy scaffolding onto my husband's car and flattened it, what a mess.
I live in the North West of England, not far from an area in Tameside where a tornado hit at around 10 pm on 27th December 2023. It demolished three dwellings on a line of row houses and it caused a great deal of damage in the surrounding infrastructure and services. These kinds of extreme weather events are becoming far more frequent in the Republic of Ireland and the UK, it’s very concerning.
My dad survived the 1974 Omaha, NE EF4 wedge tornado (& a plane crash, gas explosion, shooting, stabbing, woke up & started walking & talking after a 3-month coma). Thought he'd be here forever with that record, but it was a heart attack in 2019. His description of being in a massive tornado was truly nightmare fuel.
I'm glad I live in northern Brazil, we don't have these scary things over here, we have, crime, corruption and lots of tropical diseases, but thank God not tornadoes
Believe it or not, you can have wedge EF1 tornadoes and rope EF5 tornadoes. So all should be treated as if they are high end. You never really know until it's all over with.
Agreeing with OP, but I think what should also be said, is that the EF scale doesn't tell us anything about the tornado's strength itself. The EF scale is only a reference for the damage it caused while on the ground. For instance, there's been at least one tornado with a record of 300+ mph wind speed, but was classified as an EF3 because it didn't do enough damage to be classified as an EF 5. That's why we should treat every tornado like it's going to be a big one. Cause you never know if it actually is or not.
@@ghostsuru8429That’s partially true. The EF scale can tell how powerful a tornado was IF the tornado hit structures strong enough to show evidence of its power. A ferocious tornado in an open, grass pasture can be rated EF-1 due to no evidence of its strength. However, a weak tornado will never be rated higher than it should be if it happens to hit an area with all kinds of structures and only causes weak tornado damage. Weak tornadoes can also be deadly if they happen to hit you with a piece of debris in the wrong spot or cause something to fall on you, like a tree branch.
@@camifxyeah a rope or any kind of "skinny" tornado being an EF5 is particularly dangerous because they'll tend to move on the ground faster and have a tighter core of rotation. Almost providing a rapid explosive force. A thick boi wedge can be just as dangerous but usually is easier to see coming (except night-nadoes and rain wrapped ones)and in a lot of cases it moves slower. But those will scour the ground like a slow moving powerful street scrubber
@@justinbonds2002 Those skinny ones are also the terrifying ones that act like they have a mind of their own and just murder or spare at a god's whims....
They probably meant that when these things first form and come down, people don't recognize the initial signs because it's so huge, and if it drops down right on top of them, what can they do? I know one thing I'll take California earthquakes over tornadoes any day
@@janew7008I was in the Loma Prieta quake. Not fun, with destruction extending over 60 miles from epicenter. Now I’m in the Sierras where quakes are mild, but have had near misses with wildfires, severe smoke, blackouts due to windstorms. I estimate I shoveled 22 tons of snow from last winter’s worst storm.
It's scary when you go outside and you see the entire wall cloud on the ground. (also wedge tornados look smaller than they actually are. That wind field is invisible and it's death. )
@@janew7008I’ll take tornadoes over huge earthquakes. At least tornadoes can be predicted and give you time to run to shelter. Even the strongest tornadoes can’t pancake a double decker bridge, squishing the people on the bottom layer. 😬
They're cool. I love watching them. I've chased after them on foot. Kayak and motorcycle. Always wanted to get as close as I could. Got kids now tho. Can't be an idiot
That stovepipe twister was a real looker, wow So far no twisters have touched down in my area, but we've had some very ominous funnel clouds that didn't touch down and we've seen more waterspouts
The scariest tornadoes are the ones that hit at night when it is dark outside.😢. People can't see the cloud formation, and they depend solely on radar and on warning systems.🙏
Yesterday I survive a direct hit on my house in Clarksville TN.. IT WAS ABSOLUTELY HORRIFYING!!! I'm utterly traumatized. If I hear anything that sound like it I jump.. I'm never ever ever looking at stormes them same. They are deadly dangerous. Stay safe & prepared ❤
I think the shape of the tornado is not the most important. There are also pretty recognizable wedge shaped ones. What actually matters the most is whether it is rain wrapped or not. A rain wrapped tornado causes most of the problems that the videomaker is talking about.
@@evilsharkey8954 yeah but most wedges DO come rain wrapped. And usually are E4 on top of it because of the conditions needed to sustain a wedge are already ridiculously dangerous to begin with. Hence why they get called the "most deadly" they have a general higher chance of killing professionals as well as regular folks due to not being seen.
@@chey7691 If a tornado is rain wrapped, you can’t see it, so you can’t determine what shape it is. Any tornado shape can be rain wrapped, from weak ropes to massive wedges and multi-vortex tornadoes.
@@evilsharkey8954 dude I have talked to you before, you aren't all there clearly. So let me explain it with crayons. You can see it IF YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH, not many survive such a close encounter. Hence why it gets called the most deadly kind of tornado, it kills more amateur and professional storm chasers. So yeah if it looks like a wall of rain denser than usual in a certain part and wind blowing weirdly RUN.
@@chey7691 You’re missing the point and being a prick about it. Many types of tornadoes can be rain wrapped. They’re ALL dangerous when they’re rain wrapped because you can’t see them until you’re very close, if at all (if it’s dark enough, you’re not going to see that thing until you’re in it). The Venn diagram of rain wrapped tornadoes and wedges is not total overlap. Besides, “wedge” is not a scientific term. It’s chaser slang for a tornado that appears wider than the distance from the ground to the cloud base. It’s a descriptor of shape and proportions, nothing else.
Also any tornado can be "rain-wrapped" which means that it is entirely masked by heavy rain and you can't see it. Keep a battery powered radio and take cover as soon as you hear a warning. My friend who was killed by an EF4 had only 2 minutes warning before she was hit. This kind of late warning is rare, but it still happens.
If it's to quiet be on the lookout you can feel it in the air The leafs on the tree point in a direction you know where it's coming from if the birds get the hell out of there you need to do the same
Oh, my sister agrees with you! She was driving through Nebraska, with a car that looked like a golf ball (totally unrelated hail storm), and realized… the air is green. So she turned on the radio. To hear the NWS Severe Weather Alarm. Three counties were named as having a ‘funnel on the ground. Seek shelter now’. She’s thinking “I don’t know where I am!” Looking around. And seeing the funnel. She called her best friend and said, “If you don’t hear from me in an hour, please call my Mom and let her know I’m in Nebraska. I can see the tornado.”
Everyone of those can run you through with debris, and you don't even have to be that close. Most tornadoes fatalities and damage comes from debris being flung at ridiculous speeds. But there is no denying that one that just picks up your whole car or house is absolutely terrifying.
I remember one time I was returning back to Arizona from Colorado and we almost went through the mountains but decided the storm overhanging them was too narly for our taste. It was only later we learned there was a tornado in that very same region. So man talk about dodging a bullet. Or rather a plank of wood through the chest.
Didn't know there were that many tornados. I was in a truck stop, very cloudy, people on the CB were saying there was a tornado close to the truck stop, I kept looking and didn't see anything. They said they could see it, but it mustve been a wedge tornado hidden in the clouds.
Any rain-wrapped tornado is hard to see, so it could've been one of the other forms and those people knew what to look for. Regardless, I am glad it didn't come at you!
@@aste4949 Thanks. I thought I was safe with 40-50,000lb steel coils on my trailer. How's a tornado going to lift that? My cab was aluminum, it would have lifted that like a gingerbread house, I was so naive.
@@happydays8171An EF 5 wouldn’t even be able to lift those coils, but it would batter the cab with 250+ mph debris and turn the windows into the world’s sharpest sandblasting medium.
Jo: "Where's my truck...?" [the truck crashes back to earth, right in the middle of the road, in front of the truck Melissa is driving] Jo: "There it is!"
Oklahoma has seen its fair share of devastating wedge tornados. A lot of comments point this out but another factor is whether the tornado is rain wrapped. If it's rain wrapped you can't see it cause it just looks like clouds. If you live in a place where tornados are common know what a wall cloud looks like and what other signs come with tornados because those may be the only warning you get.
About two weeks ago, we had a devastating EF4 tornado in Kentucky fortunately we were not in the path of the tornado but I’m just praying for all the people that died that day❤❤❤
One time I was in West Texas and they had huge dirt devils everywhere. One was coming across the road and I thought nothing of it but when I drove past it rocked the heck out of my car.
I can barely see any of the video because there is so much junk covering it. Search suggestion, channel name, link to another video, long video title with hashtags, "original sound", not to mention all the usual interaction buttons on the side. And apparently there are captions, but I can't read them because they are also hidden behind the junk. Please keep this in mind when making shorts. The actual visible part of the screen is tiny.
I have been terrified by tornadoes since I first saw "The Wizard Of Oz" at about age 5.I had and still have nightmares of being chased by tornadoes. Every time the sirens go off, it freaks me out. Last year we had about half a dozen in the area and some damage was done to homes just a couple miles away. So they scare me. But I'm also awestruck and fascinated by them. The violent and capricious nature of nature itself is incredible. I've never seen a tornado or funnel cloud. But if I did I would be terrified and transfixed by the raw power of the earth and sky. Lots of adrenaline. It'd be really cool. At least until it clobbered me. Just the same, I'd rather not come face to face with a tornado, thank you very much! 😳🙏🏻☮️✌️😁
I experienced a wedge tornado going through west Kansas driving on Hwy 50 towards Colorado. It was over a mile wide! Horrible distruction my family and I witnessed!
I lived in Wichita Falls Texas in 1979 when 3 tornados came together and formed a tornado a mile wild at the base and went across the ground for 9 miles. Sometimes the middle one would pick up and the 2houses on the sides would be destroyed and the one in the middle would be practically untouched.
Umm wedge tornados are not as wide as they are tall. Wedge tornados are wider than their base height. Base height refers to the lower part of storm where the clouds end. The average thunder storm is about 7.5 miles high. The widest ever about 3.2 miles in width
@@bruhhastakenYeah how dare them know more about the science and facts of something actually interesting and good to know. How DARE them correct someone on important facts. Ballfondler detected or whatever.
Tell me about it. 2 years all lost exactly from having my town cut in half by a ef 3/4 then going to parallel twin tornados today on my bday again had another huge wedge come thru Dec 11th 21 and Dec 9th 23 tornado outbreaks and this one today decided to attack north Nashville and Bowling Green again. Welcome to global warming up is down fall is spring and Kentucky is tornado ally at night.
Hearing these brave men’s terrified screams made me cry, pray for them as my heart breaks. I remember there were 4 storm chasers lost due to that storm. May God be with these brave weather people putting their lives at risk to protect and save us. 🙏🏻
The dangerous thing about tornadoes is they are so unpredictable. They can show up with little to no warning depending on the velocity. They sling debris at an extremely high rate of speed. They hop around! One home can be completely 🌪️destroyed while the house next to it is hardly touched. Best thing to have is a storm shelter!
Yikes! I was in Kentucky once and there was a tornado in the distance. There was an announcement to go to the basement. When I saw the Texans hot foot it to safety, I moved quickly because they weren't messing around.
I live in Alabama & have since 1985. I've seen all of those types of tornadoes. And lived thankfully! None of them turn out pretty! Two towns I've lived in have been leveled (think bomb) by EF-5's. In both we were spared by mere yards! Edit: When I was just 6 there were 5 tornadoes touching down at once & we were on the interstate. A wind gust spun us around like in the wizard of oz! My mother regained control & pulled over under an over pass with many other cars. I don't remember anything else. But it was wild seeing 4 tornadoes in front of us & one behind! They came out of nowhere!
That was the Joplin Mo tornado. It was 1.8 mile wide and it's widest and a EF5. People that we over 70 miles away could see it and some people that far away had debris from it.
I was don’t live in that area of Missouri but I lived a couple hours away but at that time we were in Florida while my mom was pregnant with my little sister who was born later In august
My family church was destroyed in that tornado. Mt. Moriah. My uncles house just missed being hit by it. I was in Sellersburg at the time, but I live in Henryville now. Our families probably know each other, both my parents graduated from Henryville.
Ooh, I get goosebumps in pure awe when I look at tornados. (On screen; I'm Swedish, and we thankfully don't really have tornados here) When there's thunder storms I sometimes can't help myself from looking out the window. The power of nature is so mezmerizing!
I live in Florida and people always question how i can do that considering hurricanes. The average hurricane, when it hits my property, flies at about 60-100mph. We also have days to prepare and know exactly where it is at all times. The average tornado, a fickle and indecisive bastard, is much more concentrated and much harder to track.
Technically, it’s not the shape of the tornado that makes wedges hard to see. It’s being rain wrapped. Any rain wrapped tornado is especially dangerous, since you don’t know what’s hiding behind the rain curtains. The El Reno was a notorious rain wrapped killer, taking three experienced storm chasers. They knew there was a tornado in there, somewhere, but they had no idea it had grown to an unprecedented 2.6 mile wide monster and changed direction.
I remember living in Kansas when I was younger and going through tornado season. I remember once seeing a semi trailer fly by like a sheet of paper, and another time finding a 2 x 4 board through a pine tree… thank goodness we didn’t live there long 😅 We moved to earthquake, forest fires and landslides instead. 🙆🏻♀️
I was in a F5 tornado in the town of Jarrell tx on May 27, 1997 27 lives were taken that day three lives were lost in Austin Texas that day too. I was on I 35 just south of Gerald watching that tornado on the east side of I 35 underneath an overpass I want you guys to stay safe out there and God bless you, give me a thumbs up if you like my comment
I live in Texas, and having been in tornados I have seen the aftermath of those things. Tornados scare the hell out of me. Mother Nature is beautiful and scary at the same time, so I show her lots of respect.
This stuff is terrifying. A wedge tornado came within 1/4 mile of our house when I was little. You couldn't really see the tornado, it was just a wall that didn't look much different from rain, but the tornado sirens were going off. Driving through that part of town later was extremely sobering. Everything was normal and then, when you drove further, there was just nothing. Similarly, the Joplin tornado in 2011. I don't know if that was a wedge, but the width of the destruction sure looked like it. We often went through Joplin on road trips, and there was one particular hotel we always stayed at. Mom knew the way, so she didn't have GPS or maps or anything. We passed through less than a week after that tornado, and it was... crushing. Huge portions of the town just flattened and unrecognizable. We were exhausted, especially ending the day with such an awful sight, but we couldn't find our usual hotel for the longest time. We finally realized that we had passed by it multiple times... at least, where it used to be... but it was just completely gone. EDIT: Just looked it up - the Joplin tornado was indeed a wedge. Almost a mile wide.
From the age of like four or five (starting, in large part, thanks to The Wizard of Oz), I developed a *SEVERE* phobia of tornadoes and would be terrified that one was imminent ANY TIME the mildest thunderstorm passed through, even though the area (Pennsylvania, in the Appalachian region) has, historically, almost NEVER gotten any. I also learned about wedge tornadoes at a VERY young age because one of my early grade school teachers grew up in an area that had a wide variety, and high frequency, of tornadoes, and would tell our class stories about her memories of those storms, the warning signs of them, and the measures her family and school took to protect themselves from them (which also caused me to develop a weird fixation over the fact that we didn't have a storm cellar)... and learning about HALF A MILE TO TWO AND A HALF MILE WIDE tornadoes that could move in fast, totally unpredictable paths scared the living shit out of me even more. My family members, and even my teachers, would CONSTANTLY tell us that it was "impossible" for tornadoes to hit anywhere NEAR our town because the mountains "blocked" them and "protected us" and whatnot.. but, I never trusted that logic (which either made me better at seeing through lies than everyone else my age, or just smarter than the adults if they actually believed the nonsense they were spewing, because none of that is based in reality, at all, and didn't make sense to me, even as a young child, because I figured that, if that WERE the case, then the mountains would ALSO block things like blizzards and even REGULAR thunderstorms). Anyway, after YEARS of anxiety and legit panic attacks every time it rained even moderately hard, as well as vivid nightmares about my house getting destroyed and causing my family to be graphically torn apart, etcetera, a tornado actually DID end up hitting my area overnight when I was in late grade school (maybe fifth or sixth grade), and I SLEPT THROUGH IT-even though it broke a tree in half RIGHT in my NEXT door NEIGHBOR'S yard and sent half of it through the back of his house (RIGHT outside my bedroom window), and tore up a TON of shit across basically the entire town as it skipped around the whole area, lol.
I love hearing people's stories from famous tornadoes. Tornadoes themselves have always fascinated me, I would love to pursue a career in Meteorology, to help save lives from tornadoes is just beyond word amazing.❤❤❤❤ My heart goes out to all who have suffered from tornadoes.
I live in Colorado. When tornadoes sweep along here they span a mile wide and move just like a plow generally in one direction north to south for miles. In the plains area near DIA you'll see sporadic sections of slanted fences along the fields to break up the wind so it's harder for them to accumulate into their hugeness 😮
My college town was hit by a wedge tornado during the tornado outbreak years ago. They said it was over a mile long and it unfortunately killed 2 people. The town is very rural though, so even though it left a path of destruction, it wasn’t as bad as it would have if it came through a more highly populated area.
There's a rare subtype of the wedge tornado, which has been nicknamed The Walking Deadman, a multivortex tornado... a rather famous (or infamous) one was the May 27, 1997 Jarrell TX ef5 tornado
No. Mobile parks and cheap construction are built in tornado alley, because the people who live there can’t afford to move to a safer place. The land is cheap
@@averycheesypotato That is a common joke among many including myself and I am living in such a place now. I’ve lived in multiple areas associated with the name “tornado alley” and had a tornado once bound over my own house and head into an area under development where, fortunately, only the first roadways had been marked out. As a kid in Kansas I saw a tornado touchdown in our neighborhood and take the roofs off of the houses next door to one side while leaving the rest of us unaffected. I was looking from a small basement window that was just above ground level. And when I shouted about it I got whipped for being near a window. I know the wrath of tornadoes and hurricanes (having lost a house to a hurricane) as well as the wrath of a frightened grandmother. I’ll take the tornado or hurricane over the grandmother any day. Oops, another joke!
That old movie Twister was the main reason I recognized in terror when one touched down outside my home in upstate NY, many years ago. I started rushing my sisters into our home's hallway, while our elders stoof in shock as they stared out the windows. We were lucky the worst that happened was the willow tree at the edge of the yard being yanked out, falling across the road. While the willow was an heirloom tree from my dad's grandmother, our family counted our blessings when we checked up on the rest of the county. So many other people's homes weren't so lucky.
No matter what the tornado, they all need to be respected. When you don't respect a tornados, it might be your last mistake. Pay attention, stay aware of your surroundings.
April 1993. Aden bottoms to Browns, IL oninto Indiana. Including side winders. Picked up back waters. Looked like dirty cotton batting with tree branches in it when I saw it. They weren't branches. They were trees. Couldn't see the bottom behind the house we were in front of. It was silent. No sound but the windshield wipers and rain. Got away. Watched as one of the side winders turned black as it had come out of the backwater. Made it to a friend's house to call it in. Watched it through the picture window. It was massive. It started as a hole in the clouds. Picked up and touched back down more than once. Took years before I could stand on the porch and watch storms again. Lady in Browns lost her life. 😢
The El Reno tornado that killed 4 storm chasers (RIP) was 2.6 miles wide (wider than Manhattan!),with multiple vortices around the main funnel,packing the strongest winds. The entire thing was rain wrapped (concealed),making it incredibly difficult to identify with the naked eye.
Something wild that's been discovered just in the last couple of decades is that multiple vortices is actually more the norm than the exception, even with smaller tornadoes. Most of the time, they're there, but they haven't condensed, so they're invisible. Either way, wedges are definitely the scariest, simply from the sheer size the damage paths can be.
The surrounding tornadoes had stronger winds??
That’s amazing
@@amistry605the strongest tornadoes have multiple rotating vortexes that all rotate around a center
@@omegabyte3541 But why would the surrounding tornadoes be stronger?
A Rain wrapped wedge nocturnal tornado are stuff of nightmares
Twister flashbacks.
You know it's bad when the air starts screaming.
The only I can say comes close is when I was in Jamaica as a child and we were hit by a hurricane. The whole country was covered by it, the screaming winds sounded like a freight train and the concrete walls groaned, tree bark stripped off on many trees across the country. Rooves gone, parts of communities sliding down the mountains. And lightning of every colour but black and so frequent and bright that without a clock you can't tell if it's midnight or high noon.
I'll never forget hearing a caller call in saying he saw lights moving around in the woods behind his house. It took him a while to realise they were the headlights of cars being tossed by a massive cone tornado.
Ew! Ewwwww! That sounds like the Earth's version of Freddy Kruger.
I was in El Reno during the 2013 tornado my uncle lived there and we were helping him with clean up of a few of his rent properties in Moore from that tornado. We were outside watching it, thinking it was just a wall cloud because it was so big (when you live in Oklahoma you get pretty used to tornadoes) but a storm chaser drove by and told us that it was already on the ground and that it was the biggest and fastest tornado he’d ever seen and he thought there was a chance in could turn towards us. So at that point we decided it was probably time to go into the shelter. I’m still in awe of the size and power of that tornado
Moore seems to attract some really nasty tornadoes.
Hear me out. 2011 one was far deadly than the 2013 one.
@patriotenfield3276 Yes, it was deadlier, but only by 1 fatality. The 2013 El Reno tornado stayed mostly over open land. The NWS survey teams focus on the property damage to give it's rating, and because of that it was given an EF3 rating. Storm Chasers to this day say that the tornado should have been given an EF5 rating. The 2011 El Reno tornado had max winds of 151 mph. The 2013 El Reno tornado had max winds at 302 mph, the second highest ever recorded. The 2013 El Reno is the largest tornado ever recorded in history, but it's wind speed is still lower than the 1999 Bridge Creek-Moore which was measured at 318 mph. So yes, the 2011 El Reno was and EF5, the 2013 was an EF3 (because it had weakened by the time it hit property), the 2011 tornado still pales in comparison to the 2013 tornado.
WOW
@@beckiekins07
You mentioned two different El Reno tornadoes. Are you referring to Joplin from 2011?
I was in the 1979 Wichita Falls, Tx tornado. It was a wedge, and that’s my exact reaction. The sirens were going off and I saw people in the street pointing at something. When I stepped outside I saw it. I thought, “Oh God. Please tell me that’s rain.” Because it looked like an intense, localized downpour. When I saw the debris spinning around in it I went in, grabbed my little brother, and threw my mom’s mattress over us.
I had just moved from WF when that occurred. It was devastating. I now live in Waco, Texas.
I had an Aunt and Uncle that lost their home in that tornado.
I remember when I was stationed at Sheppard AFB in Wichita Falls, there was this really bad storm coming in but I didn't know it got tornadoes
Yup. One of *the* worst ever recorded. It was a monster tornado
My grandpa passed from that tornado. They say its probably even higher than f5 if there was a category. At my grandma's funeral in 2017 they still talked about it
My hometown was nearly hit by a mile-wide rain-wrapped EF4 wedge tornado in 2019. The town just north of us was gone. Not damaged-gone.
😮😢
Saying that’s tragic is an understatement, and I’m sorry to all those affected :(
So no survivors from the town north of you. 😢
@@bananabreadloaf I’m not sure what the casualty count was, but there’s a reason houses in tornado alley have basements. A tornado will sweep a house away and leave the basement intact. As long as you’re underground, you’ll be okay.
@@techi9818That's not always true. Many homes are on a crawlspace or slab in these areas. Sometimes because the water table or soil type won't allow for a basement. Also let's not forget about our friends in the trailer parks.
The debris field from the wedge is unbelievable. I know that from personal experience trying to find survivors
Bless you. That must have been exceptionally difficult. ❤
My heart sank like lead reading that last line. I am so sorry.
I hope you have gotten some emotional support…that is incredibly traumatic..
@@MermaidMakes I'm a combat medic veteran and a doctor. I've seen more hell than most people see in a very long life. Nope. It's not easy. Nothing in life is. I have a punching bag that helps. And racquetball is the best anger management around. Thank you
@@kdallas3966 thank you for your service. I respect you so much for everything you’ve done!! I have C-ptsd though mine is from childhood trauma, but I have also seen things I would not wish on anyone. Exercise is an excellent way to unload all the anger and frustration from what we’ve been through. I should really get a punching bag. Haha.
I live in an active area. You get to a point where you know whats coming - the color of the sky, the shape of the clouds, the "green lightning" effect, the blast of the approaching outflow boundary, the hail, the sideways stinging rain. And then there comes those terrible few moments when you realize that seconds are precious commodities and your next decisions will define your life expectancy. Serious stuff.
You seem like you’d be a book writer.
@@kadi9682 Well thank you!
Like literal green lightning? I ask because I was in a tornadic storm in 1985. The lightning was constant. It alternated between red and white, with several green flashes included. It was an epileptic's nightmare.
@@dianefarley37 I've only ever seen a greenish tint in my own experiences, but I wouldn't doubt that there could be other atmospheric conditions that might lead to different observations. Lots of high energy interactions going on in these events, after all. My own experiences have all taken place in the same general region, and always under very similar initial conditions, so others in different areas may well see things that I don't see. I'd love to know if that could be the case!
But yes, the green tint has been markedly visible in my personal experiences, to answer your question.
out of curiosity, why would you choose to live in an area that gets frequent tornados? i’ve always thought of that as like tempting fate or something, never understood it
I had no idea that there was a variety of tornadoes! Thank you for expanding my understanding
What’s crazy about Tornados is that after-flow.
The tornado moves on, but the winds behind it are more violent, faster, and do terrible damage.
There is some logic and afterthought in this comment
Those winds behind the tornado are what's driving the tornado.
It'd called rear wind down draft and it is intense but not MORE dangerous as you stated
@@sandasturner9529Or feeds it?
@@jordancobb7553Very interesting! 😳
The tornado that hit Leitrim village, Ireland (yes Ireland!) last week was a wedge tornado, did a lot of damage.
I find it weird no one talks about it. Maybe people think it's fake? Which is real sad if that's true...
@@ghostsuru8429 Definitely not fake, I don't know where you live, but we do get the odd tornado in Ireland. My house was hit by one 1/Jan/2004, it knocked down some extremely heavy scaffolding onto my husband's car and flattened it, what a mess.
The isles get a lot more tornados than they actually think. I'm glad you were safe.
I hope nobody got hurt
I live in the North West of England, not far from an area in Tameside where a tornado hit at around 10 pm on 27th December 2023. It demolished three dwellings on a line of row houses and it caused a great deal of damage in the surrounding infrastructure and services. These kinds of extreme weather events are becoming far more frequent in the Republic of Ireland and the UK, it’s very concerning.
My dad survived the 1974 Omaha, NE EF4 wedge tornado (& a plane crash, gas explosion, shooting, stabbing, woke up & started walking & talking after a 3-month coma). Thought he'd be here forever with that record, but it was a heart attack in 2019. His description of being in a massive tornado was truly nightmare fuel.
Sounds like he flipped off death
@@CullenRTerry many times! A heart attack took him in 2019 at 63. I still hear his voice in my head saying Dad-isms a lot. ♡
I'm glad I live in northern Brazil, we don't have these scary things over here, we have, crime, corruption and lots of tropical diseases, but thank God not tornadoes
And tarantulas
@@karag4487yes! Even the Wandering spiders that are prevalent in that area. No thanks! I’ll take tornadoes any day.
LMAOOOO 😅. Oh, yes, thank GOD you only have those things and not tornadoes 😂.
There a some tornadoes down south here in Brazil, but yeah, still not as scary as being Oklahoman.
Yo can't have all the disasters in one country.
Believe it or not, you can have wedge EF1 tornadoes and rope EF5 tornadoes. So all should be treated as if they are high end. You never really know until it's all over with.
Agreeing with OP, but I think what should also be said, is that the EF scale doesn't tell us anything about the tornado's strength itself. The EF scale is only a reference for the damage it caused while on the ground.
For instance, there's been at least one tornado with a record of 300+ mph wind speed, but was classified as an EF3 because it didn't do enough damage to be classified as an EF 5.
That's why we should treat every tornado like it's going to be a big one. Cause you never know if it actually is or not.
@@ghostsuru8429That’s partially true. The EF scale can tell how powerful a tornado was IF the tornado hit structures strong enough to show evidence of its power. A ferocious tornado in an open, grass pasture can be rated EF-1 due to no evidence of its strength. However, a weak tornado will never be rated higher than it should be if it happens to hit an area with all kinds of structures and only causes weak tornado damage.
Weak tornadoes can also be deadly if they happen to hit you with a piece of debris in the wrong spot or cause something to fall on you, like a tree branch.
Greater then ropes being it. Almost the greater side a wedge is the strongest.
@@camifxyeah a rope or any kind of "skinny" tornado being an EF5 is particularly dangerous because they'll tend to move on the ground faster and have a tighter core of rotation. Almost providing a rapid explosive force. A thick boi wedge can be just as dangerous but usually is easier to see coming (except night-nadoes and rain wrapped ones)and in a lot of cases it moves slower. But those will scour the ground like a slow moving powerful street scrubber
@@justinbonds2002 Those skinny ones are also the terrifying ones that act like they have a mind of their own and just murder or spare at a god's whims....
As a Kansan, people shouldn’t have been caught unaware. They sound like a freight train overhead and can be heard miles away.
They probably meant that when these things first form and come down, people don't recognize the initial signs because it's so huge, and if it drops down right on top of them, what can they do? I know one thing I'll take California earthquakes over tornadoes any day
@@janew7008I was in the Loma Prieta quake. Not fun, with destruction extending over 60 miles from epicenter. Now I’m in the Sierras where quakes are mild, but have had near misses with wildfires, severe smoke, blackouts due to windstorms. I estimate I shoveled 22 tons of snow from last winter’s worst storm.
Ah maybe with it being in the rain people thought it was thunder and lightning and a heavy storm?
It's scary when you go outside and you see the entire wall cloud on the ground. (also wedge tornados look smaller than they actually are. That wind field is invisible and it's death. )
@@janew7008I’ll take tornadoes over huge earthquakes. At least tornadoes can be predicted and give you time to run to shelter. Even the strongest tornadoes can’t pancake a double decker bridge, squishing the people on the bottom layer. 😬
I live in a place where there's no tornadoes thankfully.
No tornadoes yet*
@@L28ETMe in Northwestern Europe..
@@L28ETwell in a desert like climate can't say yet. We hardly get any rains. And if it rains it's usually due to cloud seeding.
Me too
They're cool. I love watching them. I've chased after them on foot. Kayak and motorcycle. Always wanted to get as close as I could. Got kids now tho. Can't be an idiot
That stovepipe twister was a real looker, wow
So far no twisters have touched down in my area, but we've had some very ominous funnel clouds that didn't touch down and we've seen more waterspouts
The scariest tornadoes are the ones that hit at night when it is dark outside.😢. People can't see the cloud formation, and they depend solely on radar and on warning systems.🙏
Yesterday I survive a direct hit on my house in Clarksville TN.. IT WAS ABSOLUTELY HORRIFYING!!! I'm utterly traumatized. If I hear anything that sound like it I jump.. I'm never ever ever looking at stormes them same. They are deadly dangerous. Stay safe & prepared ❤
glad you’re okay ! that same tornado ripped through my neighborhood as well and did a ton of damage, praying for you and your family !
I'm glad you all are safe. It must be devastating. 🙏🏻🙏🏻☮️🇺🇸
I'm sorry 🙏💚🇮🇪🙏🙏
Thank God you’re ok! I was in one as a child in the 80’s. I have PTSD from it.
@@ganjapreneur931praying for you and your neighbors as well!
I think the shape of the tornado is not the most important. There are also pretty recognizable wedge shaped ones.
What actually matters the most is whether it is rain wrapped or not. A rain wrapped tornado causes most of the problems that the videomaker is talking about.
Exactly! The only wedges that are mistaken for low hanging clouds are rain wrapped. When they’re rain wrapped, even expert chasers can’t see them.
@@evilsharkey8954 yeah but most wedges DO come rain wrapped. And usually are E4 on top of it because of the conditions needed to sustain a wedge are already ridiculously dangerous to begin with. Hence why they get called the "most deadly" they have a general higher chance of killing professionals as well as regular folks due to not being seen.
@@chey7691 If a tornado is rain wrapped, you can’t see it, so you can’t determine what shape it is. Any tornado shape can be rain wrapped, from weak ropes to massive wedges and multi-vortex tornadoes.
@@evilsharkey8954 dude I have talked to you before, you aren't all there clearly. So let me explain it with crayons. You can see it IF YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH, not many survive such a close encounter. Hence why it gets called the most deadly kind of tornado, it kills more amateur and professional storm chasers. So yeah if it looks like a wall of rain denser than usual in a certain part and wind blowing weirdly RUN.
@@chey7691 You’re missing the point and being a prick about it. Many types of tornadoes can be rain wrapped. They’re ALL dangerous when they’re rain wrapped because you can’t see them until you’re very close, if at all (if it’s dark enough, you’re not going to see that thing until you’re in it). The Venn diagram of rain wrapped tornadoes and wedges is not total overlap.
Besides, “wedge” is not a scientific term. It’s chaser slang for a tornado that appears wider than the distance from the ground to the cloud base. It’s a descriptor of shape and proportions, nothing else.
Also any tornado can be "rain-wrapped" which means that it is entirely masked by heavy rain and you can't see it. Keep a battery powered radio and take cover as soon as you hear a warning. My friend who was killed by an EF4 had only 2 minutes warning before she was hit. This kind of late warning is rare, but it still happens.
"Dead Man Walking Tornado" has entered the chat
That fucker in Jarell was a damn demon! It slowed down and just mulched an entire neighborhood...
The worst part is…. How I can’t see half of what I’m being shown thanks to the words on the screen blocking my view.
Thanks to Google Tube...🤬
If it's to quiet be on the lookout you can feel it in the air
The leafs on the tree point in a direction you know where it's
coming from if the birds get the hell out of there you need to do the same
I’ve always looked to nature as a guide. Sometimes we just have to slow down and pay attention.
You can def feel one coming!
I believe that all tornadoes are scary and dangerous, but that's my opinion.
Oh, my sister agrees with you!
She was driving through Nebraska, with a car that looked like a golf ball (totally unrelated hail storm), and realized… the air is green. So she turned on the radio. To hear the NWS Severe Weather Alarm. Three counties were named as having a ‘funnel on the ground. Seek shelter now’. She’s thinking “I don’t know where I am!” Looking around. And seeing the funnel.
She called her best friend and said, “If you don’t hear from me in an hour, please call my Mom and let her know I’m in Nebraska. I can see the tornado.”
Everyone of those can run you through with debris, and you don't even have to be that close. Most tornadoes fatalities and damage comes from debris being flung at ridiculous speeds. But there is no denying that one that just picks up your whole car or house is absolutely terrifying.
Any shape, coming over your roof, around 2 a.m. is Scary.
Seeing a lot more of these in Tennessee and Alabama
I remember one time I was returning back to Arizona from Colorado and we almost went through the mountains but decided the storm overhanging them was too narly for our taste. It was only later we learned there was a tornado in that very same region. So man talk about dodging a bullet. Or rather a plank of wood through the chest.
Didn't know there were that many tornados. I was in a truck stop, very cloudy, people on the CB were saying there was a tornado close to the truck stop, I kept looking and didn't see anything. They said they could see it, but it mustve been a wedge tornado hidden in the clouds.
Any rain-wrapped tornado is hard to see, so it could've been one of the other forms and those people knew what to look for. Regardless, I am glad it didn't come at you!
@@aste4949
Thanks.
I thought I was safe with 40-50,000lb steel coils on my trailer. How's a tornado going to lift that? My cab was aluminum, it would have lifted that like a gingerbread house, I was so naive.
@@happydays8171An EF 5 wouldn’t even be able to lift those coils, but it would batter the cab with 250+ mph debris and turn the windows into the world’s sharpest sandblasting medium.
Swegle Studios has a video covering many more types of tornadoes and whirlwinds if you're interested.
The stove pipe shown in this video is actually a landspout.
Cows. We got cows
Bill: "Jo. Things go wrong! You can't explain it, you can't predict it!!!!"
“Where’s my truck”?
@@MsAubrey Melissa "AHHH AHHH AHHH AHHHHHHHH"
Jo: "Where's my truck...?"
[the truck crashes back to earth, right in the middle of the road, in front of the truck Melissa is driving]
Jo: "There it is!"
Oklahoma has seen its fair share of devastating wedge tornados. A lot of comments point this out but another factor is whether the tornado is rain wrapped. If it's rain wrapped you can't see it cause it just looks like clouds. If you live in a place where tornados are common know what a wall cloud looks like and what other signs come with tornados because those may be the only warning you get.
One of my tornados is 4 now, and it feels like dealing with three tornados
About two weeks ago, we had a devastating EF4 tornado in Kentucky fortunately we were not in the path of the tornado but I’m just praying for all the people that died that day❤❤❤
One time I was in West Texas and they had huge dirt devils everywhere. One was coming across the road and I thought nothing of it but when I drove past it rocked the heck out of my car.
Also called neak attack tornadoes... they do not immediately trigger storm warning horns In small towns.
The final boss of tornadoes ☠️
I can barely see any of the video because there is so much junk covering it. Search suggestion, channel name, link to another video, long video title with hashtags, "original sound", not to mention all the usual interaction buttons on the side. And apparently there are captions, but I can't read them because they are also hidden behind the junk. Please keep this in mind when making shorts. The actual visible part of the screen is tiny.
Oklahoman here 😂 thanks for sharing tornado info! I forget some people don’t have to live in fear. 🤣🤣🤣
When I moved to Oklahoma, I thought the air raid sirens were leftovers from WW2. Big shock.
Who lives in fear
@@KansasFarmer620People who live in tornado-prone areas.
That's not a tornado. That's a goddamn land hurricane.
A hurricane that makes landfall is still a hurricane...
Derechos:
If I had seen this, I would have assumed it was a failed tornado. Thanks for the public service announcement!
You forgot to mention the multiple vortices wedge tornadoes
i dont think there has ever been a wedge tornado that wasn't multivortex
@@mattekumba what do you mean? Of course there is. It's rare to have a wedge tornado, or any tornado, with multiple vortices.
@@binguetteIt's actually the opposite.
@@binguette how to tell us you don’t live in the Midwest without telling us
@@section8usmc53 wow. How?
I’ve been in a wedge tornado! The camper in front of us flipped over but luckily nobody got hurt 😊
It's a strange concept that something can be too big to see, but this proves it.
All tornadoes are scary , but those wedge ones are terrifying 😱 especially as you can't always recognise them .
There was literally one of those in TN the other day
Joplin, MO
I lived 100ish miles east of it. Havent slept the same since
I didn't even know there's so many different types of tornadoes
I’ve seen one outside my bedroom window when I was 15. We lived out in the country so thankfully everyone was ok
I have been terrified by tornadoes since I first saw "The Wizard Of Oz" at about age 5.I had and still have nightmares of being chased by tornadoes. Every time the sirens go off, it freaks me out. Last year we had about half a dozen in the area and some damage was done to homes just a couple miles away. So they scare me.
But I'm also awestruck and fascinated by them. The violent and capricious nature of nature itself is incredible. I've never seen a tornado or funnel cloud. But if I did I would be terrified and transfixed by the raw power of the earth and sky. Lots of adrenaline. It'd be really cool. At least until it clobbered me.
Just the same, I'd rather not come face to face with a tornado, thank you very much! 😳🙏🏻☮️✌️😁
I experienced a wedge tornado going through west Kansas driving on Hwy 50 towards Colorado. It was over a mile wide! Horrible distruction my family and I witnessed!
Nature always got some tricks up its sleeves
I lived in Wichita Falls Texas in 1979 when 3 tornados came together and formed a tornado a mile wild at the base and went across the ground for 9 miles. Sometimes the middle one would pick up and the 2houses on the sides would be destroyed and the one in the middle would be practically untouched.
Wow, this blew me away !
I have experienced 2 in my lifetime. Both 2-3 mile wide. Both sucked up the roads
Umm wedge tornados are not as wide as they are tall. Wedge tornados are wider than their base height. Base height refers to the lower part of storm where the clouds end. The average thunder storm is about 7.5 miles high. The widest ever about 3.2 miles in width
"🤓☝️" detected
@@bruhhastakenYeah how dare them know more about the science and facts of something actually interesting and good to know. How DARE them correct someone on important facts.
Ballfondler detected or whatever.
PSA WARNING --if you see a (ANY) tornado and it looks like it’s in one spot RUN RUN RUN it’s coming toward you!!
Tell me about it. 2 years all lost exactly from having my town cut in half by a ef 3/4 then going to parallel twin tornados today on my bday again had another huge wedge come thru Dec 11th 21 and Dec 9th 23 tornado outbreaks and this one today decided to attack north Nashville and Bowling Green again. Welcome to global warming up is down fall is spring and Kentucky is tornado ally at night.
Hearing these brave men’s terrified screams made me cry, pray for them as my heart breaks. I remember there were 4 storm chasers lost due to that storm. May God be with these brave weather people putting their lives at risk to protect and save us. 🙏🏻
Never knew there were variants of tornadoes
They’re mostly just shapes described by storm chasers. There’s not a lot of science behind the terms, just semi-agreed upon definitions
The dangerous thing about tornadoes is they are so unpredictable. They can show up with little to no warning depending on the velocity. They sling debris at an extremely high rate of speed. They hop around! One home can be completely 🌪️destroyed while the house next to it is hardly touched. Best thing to have is a storm shelter!
Great content
We had 70 Tornadoes at the same in Minnesota 🦋
You forgot about the ultra rare inside-out looping tornado.
Yikes! I was in Kentucky once and there was a tornado in the distance. There was an announcement to go to the basement. When I saw the Texans hot foot it to safety, I moved quickly because they weren't messing around.
Was it the devastating one from December 2022?
Only legends know this is a reupload 😏
I watched the version, and noticed I couldn't comment, so I reloaded, and it was gone.
I live in Alabama & have since 1985. I've seen all of those types of tornadoes. And lived thankfully! None of them turn out pretty! Two towns I've lived in have been leveled (think bomb) by EF-5's. In both we were spared by mere yards! Edit: When I was just 6 there were 5 tornadoes touching down at once & we were on the interstate. A wind gust spun us around like in the wizard of oz! My mother regained control & pulled over under an over pass with many other cars. I don't remember anything else. But it was wild seeing 4 tornadoes in front of us & one behind! They came out of nowhere!
The scariest part is that the tornados weren't moving! When it looks like a tornado isn't moving, it's actually coming towards you!
Finally, some real knowledge online.
That was the Joplin Mo tornado. It was 1.8 mile wide and it's widest and a EF5. People that we over 70 miles away could see it and some people that far away had debris from it.
I was don’t live in that area of Missouri but I lived a couple hours away but at that time we were in Florida while my mom was pregnant with my little sister who was born later In august
My family survived a F4 Wedge tornado. 2.5 miles wide. 3 vortexes in Henryville Indiana.
My family church was destroyed in that tornado. Mt. Moriah. My uncles house just missed being hit by it.
I was in Sellersburg at the time, but I live in Henryville now.
Our families probably know each other, both my parents graduated from Henryville.
Ooh, I get goosebumps in pure awe when I look at tornados. (On screen; I'm Swedish, and we thankfully don't really have tornados here)
When there's thunder storms I sometimes can't help myself from looking out the window. The power of nature is so mezmerizing!
I live in Florida and people always question how i can do that considering hurricanes.
The average hurricane, when it hits my property, flies at about 60-100mph. We also have days to prepare and know exactly where it is at all times.
The average tornado, a fickle and indecisive bastard, is much more concentrated and much harder to track.
A Rain Wrapped Wedge was what hit Joplin in 2011.
This is really good information, thank you.
Tornadoes scare me. When I visited family in the Midwest I refused to sleep anywhere but the basement. The green sky freaks me out too.
If they're rain wrapped, you may not even realize there's a tornado on the ground.
Wedges: Great in tater form, terrible in 'nader form.
The super wide tornado is also called the bowel movement twister……because when you see it coming at you……..yup.
Technically, it’s not the shape of the tornado that makes wedges hard to see. It’s being rain wrapped. Any rain wrapped tornado is especially dangerous, since you don’t know what’s hiding behind the rain curtains. The El Reno was a notorious rain wrapped killer, taking three experienced storm chasers. They knew there was a tornado in there, somewhere, but they had no idea it had grown to an unprecedented 2.6 mile wide monster and changed direction.
I remember living in Kansas when I was younger and going through tornado season. I remember once seeing a semi trailer fly by like a sheet of paper, and another time finding a 2 x 4 board through a pine tree… thank goodness we didn’t live there long 😅 We moved to earthquake, forest fires and landslides instead. 🙆🏻♀️
I was in a F5 tornado in the town of Jarrell tx on May 27, 1997 27 lives were taken that day three lives were lost in Austin Texas that day too. I was on I 35 just south of Gerald watching that tornado on the east side of I 35 underneath an overpass I want you guys to stay safe out there and God bless you, give me a thumbs up if you like my comment
I live in Texas, and having been in tornados I have seen the aftermath of those things. Tornados scare the hell out of me. Mother Nature is beautiful and scary at the same time, so I show her lots of respect.
This stuff is terrifying. A wedge tornado came within 1/4 mile of our house when I was little. You couldn't really see the tornado, it was just a wall that didn't look much different from rain, but the tornado sirens were going off. Driving through that part of town later was extremely sobering. Everything was normal and then, when you drove further, there was just nothing.
Similarly, the Joplin tornado in 2011. I don't know if that was a wedge, but the width of the destruction sure looked like it. We often went through Joplin on road trips, and there was one particular hotel we always stayed at. Mom knew the way, so she didn't have GPS or maps or anything. We passed through less than a week after that tornado, and it was... crushing. Huge portions of the town just flattened and unrecognizable. We were exhausted, especially ending the day with such an awful sight, but we couldn't find our usual hotel for the longest time. We finally realized that we had passed by it multiple times... at least, where it used to be... but it was just completely gone.
EDIT: Just looked it up - the Joplin tornado was indeed a wedge. Almost a mile wide.
From the age of like four or five (starting, in large part, thanks to The Wizard of Oz), I developed a *SEVERE* phobia of tornadoes and would be terrified that one was imminent ANY TIME the mildest thunderstorm passed through, even though the area (Pennsylvania, in the Appalachian region) has, historically, almost NEVER gotten any.
I also learned about wedge tornadoes at a VERY young age because one of my early grade school teachers grew up in an area that had a wide variety, and high frequency, of tornadoes, and would tell our class stories about her memories of those storms, the warning signs of them, and the measures her family and school took to protect themselves from them (which also caused me to develop a weird fixation over the fact that we didn't have a storm cellar)... and learning about HALF A MILE TO TWO AND A HALF MILE WIDE tornadoes that could move in fast, totally unpredictable paths scared the living shit out of me even more.
My family members, and even my teachers, would CONSTANTLY tell us that it was "impossible" for tornadoes to hit anywhere NEAR our town because the mountains "blocked" them and "protected us" and whatnot.. but, I never trusted that logic (which either made me better at seeing through lies than everyone else my age, or just smarter than the adults if they actually believed the nonsense they were spewing, because none of that is based in reality, at all, and didn't make sense to me, even as a young child, because I figured that, if that WERE the case, then the mountains would ALSO block things like blizzards and even REGULAR thunderstorms).
Anyway, after YEARS of anxiety and legit panic attacks every time it rained even moderately hard, as well as vivid nightmares about my house getting destroyed and causing my family to be graphically torn apart, etcetera, a tornado actually DID end up hitting my area overnight when I was in late grade school (maybe fifth or sixth grade), and I SLEPT THROUGH IT-even though it broke a tree in half RIGHT in my NEXT door NEIGHBOR'S yard and sent half of it through the back of his house (RIGHT outside my bedroom window), and tore up a TON of shit across basically the entire town as it skipped around the whole area, lol.
You slept through it!?! Jesus had your back!
We had one touch down in a small town in SC. It was kind of up and not 100% on the ground.
I live here in sc and we've had a few touch in the Lowcountry
I love hearing people's stories from famous tornadoes. Tornadoes themselves have always fascinated me, I would love to pursue a career in Meteorology, to help save lives from tornadoes is just beyond word amazing.❤❤❤❤ My heart goes out to all who have suffered from tornadoes.
I live in Colorado. When tornadoes sweep along here they span a mile wide and move just like a plow generally in one direction north to south for miles. In the plains area near DIA you'll see sporadic sections of slanted fences along the fields to break up the wind so it's harder for them to accumulate into their hugeness 😮
Thank you for the information!
My college town was hit by a wedge tornado during the tornado outbreak years ago. They said it was over a mile long and it unfortunately killed 2 people. The town is very rural though, so even though it left a path of destruction, it wasn’t as bad as it would have if it came through a more highly populated area.
There's a rare subtype of the wedge tornado, which has been nicknamed The Walking Deadman, a multivortex tornado... a rather famous (or infamous) one was the May 27, 1997 Jarrell TX ef5 tornado
Not all multi-vortex tornadoes are wedges, but, yes, they’re definitely dangerous.
When the tornadoes active their cloaking technology, that's a sign it's time to move 500 miles in any direction 😮
But they all have one thing in common…a strong attraction to mobile home parks.
No. Mobile parks and cheap construction are built in tornado alley, because the people who live there can’t afford to move to a safer place. The land is cheap
@@averycheesypotato That is a common joke among many including myself and I am living in such a place now. I’ve lived in multiple areas associated with the name “tornado alley” and had a tornado once bound over my own house and head into an area under development where, fortunately, only the first roadways had been marked out.
As a kid in Kansas I saw a tornado touchdown in our neighborhood and take the roofs off of the houses next door to one side while leaving the rest of us unaffected. I was looking from a small basement window that was just above ground level. And when I shouted about it I got whipped for being near a window. I know the wrath of tornadoes and hurricanes (having lost a house to a hurricane) as well as the wrath of a frightened grandmother. I’ll take the tornado or hurricane over the grandmother any day.
Oops, another joke!
@@johnt.inscrutable1545 sorry to hear that. Sounds like your grandma should have a storm named after her
Thank you for sharing this! Quite an eye opening education bless you and y’all stay safe ❤❤
That old movie Twister was the main reason I recognized in terror when one touched down outside my home in upstate NY, many years ago. I started rushing my sisters into our home's hallway, while our elders stoof in shock as they stared out the windows.
We were lucky the worst that happened was the willow tree at the edge of the yard being yanked out, falling across the road. While the willow was an heirloom tree from my dad's grandmother, our family counted our blessings when we checked up on the rest of the county. So many other people's homes weren't so lucky.
As someone who lives in Alaska, I had no idea that there were different kinds of tornadoes
And people ask me why im so afraid of sirens. Smh
I hate tornadoes, but I still find them freaking fascinating
No matter what the tornado, they all need to be respected. When you don't respect a tornados, it might be your last mistake. Pay attention, stay aware of your surroundings.
Xenia, Ohio. April 3, 1974.
Growing up in Oklahoma, I've only seen wedge tornadoes. I've never seen the other ones....o.o
April 1993.
Aden bottoms to Browns, IL oninto Indiana.
Including side winders.
Picked up back waters.
Looked like dirty cotton batting with tree branches in it when I saw it.
They weren't branches. They were trees.
Couldn't see the bottom behind the house we were in front of.
It was silent. No sound but the windshield wipers and rain.
Got away.
Watched as one of the side winders turned black as it had come out of the backwater.
Made it to a friend's house to call it in. Watched it through the picture window. It was massive.
It started as a hole in the clouds. Picked up and touched back down more than once.
Took years before I could stand on the porch and watch storms again.
Lady in Browns lost her life. 😢