More coverage of the Virginia tornado outbreak of April 28, 2008

(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