(The photograph to the right is linked to the source. It is a photograph included in the survey of the Suffolk, VA, tornado aftermath.) A big thank you to Mikey, for sharing a link to another video of the Suffolk, VA wedge tornado, preliminarily rated an EF-3 tornado. This tornado, one of six that were generated in this storm cell alone, damaged 1200 homes, caused $18,000,000 in damage and injured hundreds of people was 1/4 mile wide, tracked for 10 miles, and was on the ground for 15 minutes. I am actually disturbed to see so many "home videos" of this wedge. The videos I have seen are mostly taken by untrained citizens, where the tornado is dangerously close, and rather than trying to get that "weather warrior" footage to be shown on TWC, should be taking cover! Most likely, they aren't aware of storm behavior, aren't trained spotters, aren't experienced storm chasers and therefore, should NOT be endangering their lives for the footage. Folks, if there is a tornado headed toward you, get to the lowest, most interior room in your house. Cover yourself with a mattress or thick blankets. Do not try to capture your demise on video for the sake of the "weather warrior" title. OK? Good. I will get off my soap box now...
The official storm report issued by the National Weather Service in Wakefield, VA is located here (click here). On this site, you will find links to the radar and Photos of the Tornado Damage in Virginia.
(photo taken by Jason Walsh of 13News, photo links to source) Can you imagine what the residents of that home on the left are thinking...? They probably feel relief and guilt and intense sorrow... I can't even begin to imagine what it would be like to go through that kind of situation. Anyways, I found a link to a slide show (click here) of photographs taken by folks in the area where these tornadoes occurred, some very demonstrative photos of the raw power of an EF-3 tornado. It is amazing to me that there were no reported fatalities. Praise God. In many of the photos, one point stands out clearly to me... an object is only as strong as its weakest point. In many of the pictures, you see that the structure failed near the garage door. You see a crumpled garage door and walls torn off of the garage and adjoining areas. The garage is the weakest point of a house. If the garage is the location of your "safe spot" shelter, please rethink that. The photo at the start of this post exhibits that point.
Locally, cool morning to start the day and a very late school bus for Mini-Dew. All is well though, and we should face some beautiful afternoon weather. Our next shot at precipitation arrives for the weekend... just after the Relay for Life... hopefully.
Take care,
~Dewdrop
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
More coverage of the Virginia tornado outbreak of April 28, 2008
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Great write up Dew. The Dad in me told me to shut down and thus the missed video of the tornado (the right decision). I just posted images of the Waterspout I missed as it moved within 1 mile of my neighborhood. You can see it is still a very wide rotation before it came back onto land and hit the Norfolk Naval Base.
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Thanks, Mikey. I know that it is hard to make those judgment calls as storm chasers, especially, but we know when it is dangerous. I am sorry you missed the shot, but I am glad you and your family are ok. Glad it missed your home, too.
ReplyDeleteOh my that is a horrible scene. So sad
ReplyDeleteVery horrible. Horrific. I can't even imagine. The dark side of Ma Nature...
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about your commment on why there are so many video's of this Tornado. People were definitely foolish, but it shows what happens when a Tornado like this drops in a very populated area. It's one thing for an EF3 to drop in the farm lands of the midwest, but around here there is little property left that is not developed.
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From Wikipedia:
Officially, the Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News, VA-NC MSA) has a population of about 1.7 million, the 33rd-largest metropolitan area in the United States.
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If this storm has jogged more to the east and missed the river it would have hit one of the most densely populated area's on the East Coast in the city of Norfolk. Tornado's tend to Jog east when traveling and this one really stayed on a straight line into the River. This is why I got so nervous, I was in the bear cage on the right side of the storm path.
Just another Miracle that played out Monday.
SCM
I really appreciate your comment, Mikey. It always breaks my heart to hear about tornadoes hitting populated areas. It is TOTALLY different from a farmland strike, which is potential devastating to the livelihood of the farmer, but when a tornado hits a densely populated area, it's not a matter of whether or not it will get anything, it's a matter of how much... East coast naders are a whole new ball game.
ReplyDeleteThanks be to God for the miraculous outcome. We can definitely appreciate that the outcome could have been horribly worse.
I appreciate yours and SCM's comments, Dew. Especially yours, as one of my soap boxes concerns the yahoos out there that will endanger their lives and other's lives just to "see a twister!" It's lunacy and, if you know nothing about storm chasing or severe storms in general, then you have no business being out there with those of us who are trained spotters.
ReplyDeleteThat was a very horrible scene... Many properties have been damage... I imagine what would it be more lik if an F5 hit this area... :( That's just sad...
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ken. If there is any message that I want to convey through my blog, it would be weather safety and awareness. The more people know about what is going on around them, the more prepared they can be. I don't want to sound all hoity-toity to people, so I think today I will talk some about how to become more weather savvy... perfect opportunity to recruit spotters, eh? :O)
ReplyDeleteIce, Very horrible. It was quite devastating to the region. Very sad. More bad weather expected tonight.
Along side the "Fujita Scale" runs the "Darwin Scale". Sadly these dweebs will clean their own gene pool out with stunts like this. They think that their video and 15 minutes of fame will qualify them as a chaser. Soon they will be victims. Easy for me to go on and on but I think you put it out there perfectly Dew. Great write up as always. Glad the SCM and all up there with him are ok.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rick. I was relieved of that, too. Active weather season this year!
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