Multi-day outbreak of May 25-31

[RL3AO]

I don't want to sound insensitive, but Oklahoma City was fortunate yesterday. There was potential for a total catastrophe yesterday that would have been referenced for decades. A strong or violent tornado tracking across I-35 yesterday would have caused a death toll beyond belief.

[EF-5bigj]

I can't imagine the chaos with a violent tornado headed towered that city. Cars are a death trap with tornados like that I'm shocked more people where not killed still.

[Alyono]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gbgqM0JfW0[/youtube]

Here is the video of the horrible advice. The last 2 minutes especially.

To be honest, havn't there been more deaths from people sheltering in place in EF4 and EF5 tornadoes than caught on the roads?

We lost many in Tuscaloosa because people sheltered in place.

I remember hearing Bettis and Forbes discuss evacuation after Moore and they said that in that type of tornado, while evacuation is not a good option, it was better than staying in place as you at least have SOME chance by evacuating. Many in Moore apparently did in fact evacuate and lived.

TWC addressed both sides of the issue this morning from the coverage I caught. They said that while sheltering in place is best for MOST tornadoes, a legit case can be made for evacuations for the very violent ones. Those Doppler winds yesterday, IMO, did justify the evacuation decision. It was simply poorly pulled off.

To put it this way, if any of my friends and family are at risk of a violent tornado, they will be evacuating

[Ntxw]

I remember hearing Bettis and Forbes discuss evacuation after Moore and they said that in that type of tornado, while evacuation is not a good option, it was better than staying in place as you at least have SOME chance by evacuating. Many in Moore apparently did in fact evacuate and lived.

TWC addressed both sides of the issue this morning from the coverage I caught. They said that while sheltering in place is best for MOST tornadoes, a legit case can be made for evacuations for the very violent ones. Those Doppler winds yesterday, IMO, did justify the evacuation decision. It was simply poorly pulled off.

To put it this way, if any of my friends and family are at risk of a violent tornado, they will be evacuating

All very good points. I think there is some difference between an area say suburban Moore and urban Oklahoma City though. If everyone rushed at the same time in OKC you have a jam much more likely than the less dense suburb. The key in this area is being able to pin down specific areas well ahead of time, of course we are not able to do that specifically yet with the technology currently in a timely manner. It's an economic thing, but we are probably better off passing legislation to helping these people build community shelters that can quickly be accessed by residents, perhaps some sort of tunnel system.

[EF-5bigj]

Where I live I kind of worry about shelter options for violent tornadoes. I think it's a good debate though to talk about what to do if a violent tornado is headed your way. The gtg shear on that tornado was insane

[Tireman4]

I just had a mental picture of what would happen if it were Houston. There are major stalls, accidents, and general insanity if it rain, sprinkles, is overcast, or is bright and sunny. The thought of a tornado hitting during rush hour is horrifying. The overpasses alone…. Scary thought.

It happened. Hurricane Rita. The evacuation. Horrible. Just horrible. It was just insane...

Over 100 people died ahead of Rita, mostly in the evacuation. Only 6 died in the storm itself. And that was in sunny skies for 2 days ahead of the storm (although it was in extreme heat, which caused many fatalities), not with severe weather bearing right down on them and nowhere to go.

I can say this. We learned from that total mess. We really did. I remember going over the old evacuation routes ( the ones we used during Rita) at NASA and thinking, I am not sure this is going to work. Everyone was supposed to go at certain periods of time. What happened was that folks panicked and everyone left at the same time. Complete mess. We learned. During Ike, we set up Contraflows and folks outside the evacuation areas were told to stay home and hunker down. Ike evacuation was amazing compared to Rita.

[gsytch]

I would just move way far out of Oklahoma, and then never have to worry about that issue again!

[brunota2003]

See, I am against evacuating during a tornado event. Those that have shelter should seek it, those who live in mobile homes that don't have shelters are the ones who need to get out. Tornadoes generally affect small portions of the land, is it really worth it to evacuate a large area, when the chances of the tornado actually hitting them are generally, pretty slim? Even in the warning area?

Just in the suburbs of OKC, in the polygon, you are talking about probably close to 50,000 or 100,000 people! There is no feasible way to evacuate that many people, even if given an hour or two. You can't tell select people to evacuate, either, because then others will think it is a good idea (or just hear "evacuate") and decide to leave. I'd rather be in a storm shelter than on the road, even if the tornado was an EF-5 monster! At least if the tornado does hit, I'd be in something built to give me a chance of survival. Outside in a ditch or car, your chances of survival would be very slim to none.

Now, in rural areas, evacuation would be more likely to succeed during a long lead time tornado event. While roads are not as well kept or big, there also are a LOT less people!

All in all, the only way to have a successful evacuation, IMO, is to evacuate when the tornado watch is first issued. But then what do you do? Evacuate the whole box? Because you don't know where the storms will form (or even if they will form), and who will be impacted. I think resources should be spent on providing metro areas with large underground shelters people can use. The airport had an underground tunnel they fit over 1,000 people in! Something like that would be more feasible. Set up strategically in a city, it would prevent traffic jams to an extent, large parking, short travel distances to the shelter (vs trying to have everyone leave the city).

[thetruesms]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gbgqM0JfW0[/youtube]

Here is the video of the horrible advice. The last 2 minutes especially.

To be honest, havn't there been more deaths from people sheltering in place in EF4 and EF5 tornadoes than caught on the roads?

We lost many in Tuscaloosa because people sheltered in place.

I remember hearing Bettis and Forbes discuss evacuation after Moore and they said that in that type of tornado, while evacuation is not a good option, it was better than staying in place as you at least have SOME chance by evacuating. Many in Moore apparently did in fact evacuate and lived.

TWC addressed both sides of the issue this morning from the coverage I caught. They said that while sheltering in place is best for MOST tornadoes, a legit case can be made for evacuations for the very violent ones. Those Doppler winds yesterday, IMO, did justify the evacuation decision. It was simply poorly pulled off.

To put it this way, if any of my friends and family are at risk of a violent tornado, they will be evacuating

NO! NO! NONONONONONONOONONONONONONONONONONONONONO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH HOW IDIOTIC THIS IS!

Once a warning is issued, sheltering in place is always always always always safer than leaving in car. The death rate in EF5 tornadoes above ground is roughly 1%. While this is a vastly higher probability of death than a random day, the vast majority of people impacted will survive. You may likely be injured, but odds for survival are in your favor. Being low to the ground in the interior portion of a sturdy shelter (eg not a mobile home) gives you your best chance to survive. In contrast, a violent tornado does this to a car:


Being in a car is the second worst place to be in a tornado warning behind being under an overpass. Likely the only thing that kept this from being one of the most deadly tornadoes in history was that it dissipated before reaching I-35, which had become a parking lot. As it was, 7 of the 9 deaths - 78% of the deaths! - were in cars.

Deciding to leave to a safe area the morning of an event, or once a watch is issued is one thing. But once the warning is issued, it is too late. At that point all you can do is find the best shelter you can.

edit - Dr. Harold Brooks putting this much better than I did - http://www.livingontherealworld.org/?p=899

[Alyono]

Have to disagree with you, SMS. We've seen hundreds killed in recent years from EF4s and 5s sheltering in place! This is far more than those killed in cars in the same tornadoes in recent years.

The 1979 Wichita Falls tornado is one often cited as an example as to why one should not run as many died in cars. Well... I've been told the real story about that from some of my fellow mets at the office. As people were fleeing, one GENIUS stopped at a red light and held up traffic... killing many of those behind him. It wasn't fleeing that caused the deaths... it was an idiot.

Now, I do agree as does TWC that for the vast majority, shelter in place. I'm talking about the 4s and 5s like Tuscaloosa or Joplin (thankfully, Joplin intensity tornadoes do not happen that often)

[Alyono]

one question I have is how many were actually killed by the tornadoes on the road yesterday and how many were killed in accidents?

[brunota2003]

It is frightening to consider that mets (not all) are going with "if you're above ground, even in a shelter, in an EF4 or EF5 tornado, there is 0% chance of survival." Even if the chance of survival is only decent, play on it. You don't want people feeling completely helpless and deciding to do nothing as a result.

One thing that is certain, though, is that manufactured homes are bad regardless of the strength of the tornado.

[brunota2003]

Have to disagree with you, SMS. We've seen hundreds killed in recent years from EF4s and 5s sheltering in place! This is far more than those killed in cars in the same tornadoes in recent years.

The 1979 Wichita Falls tornado is one often cited as an example as to why one should not run as many died in cars. Well... I've been told the real story about that from some of my fellow mets at the office. As people were fleeing, one GENIUS stopped at a red light and held up traffic... killing many of those behind him. It wasn't fleeing that caused the deaths... it was an idiot.

Now, I do agree as does TWC that for the vast majority, shelter in place. I'm talking about the 4s and 5s like Tuscaloosa or Joplin (thankfully, Joplin intensity tornadoes do not happen that often)

Perhaps the reason why many more are killed by sheltering in place is that most people are doing exactly that - sheltering in place. You can't look at the statistic from just one angle. If people abandon their cars and rush into shelter, wouldn't logic dictate that most deaths would occur in a shelter in place? If you have 100 people sheltering in place (including those who abandoned their vehicles), and 1 driving a car and 4 people die, even if the guy driving the car died, shelter in place would still have "more" deaths.

It's like with hurricanes, surge is deadly, but if you evacuate the beach (and almost everyone actually listens), then suddenly wind becomes the more deadly item, a catch 22.

[EF-5bigj]

Wow I can barely tell that is a car we should do a thread on safety during violent tornadoes. EF-4 and EF-5 tornadoes issue here where I live in Dixie Alley mobile homes are common and there are few good shelter options against violent ones. Someone I knew had her whole family killed when the Philadelphia,MS EF-5 it just shattard the mobile home and killed everyone.

[thetruesms]

Have to disagree with you, SMS. We've seen hundreds killed in recent years from EF4s and 5s sheltering in place! This is far more than those killed in cars in the same tornadoes in recent years.

The 1979 Wichita Falls tornado is one often cited as an example as to why one should not run as many died in cars. Well... I've been told the real story about that from some of my fellow mets at the office. As people were fleeing, one GENIUS stopped at a red light and held up traffic... killing many of those behind him. It wasn't fleeing that caused the deaths... it was an idiot.

Now, I do agree as does TWC that for the vast majority, shelter in place. I'm talking about the 4s and 5s like Tuscaloosa or Joplin (thankfully, Joplin intensity tornadoes do not happen that often)

You're evaluating the risk completely wrong. Yes, hundreds have died, hundreds of thousands had been affected. Considering the 4/27/11 outbreak, it might not be a stretch to say millions. The rate of death above ground in a violent tornado (4s and 5s) is generally about 1%. If you shelter in place in a violent tornado, you have a 99% chance of surviving. Probably a little higher if you have a safe room, a little lower if you have only an interior room in which to shelter. What do you think your odds are if you're sitting in this traffic jam if a violent tornado rolls through? Well less than 99% seems likely.


This does not even get into the fact that most people don't know where to flee. Morgan sent them "south". Oh, then the storm took a right turn and headed to the southeast, now putting people who wouldn't have been in the path had they stayed in their homes right back in the path with less shelter. And that's a basic track shift - that a supercell may take a right turn as a preferred deviation of track is Meteorology 101 and he didn't even think about it.

Your story of the Wichita Falls tornado does not validate fleeing, it highlights why it's stupid. Of course it's not the fleeing that's dangerous - obviously being out of the tornado's path is safer than being in it. But in an urban area, if thousands of people try to flee, traffic snarls are inevitable. One person doing something dumb in 1979 got a bunch of people caught in a death trap. Fleeing in your car puts your survival in the hands of others. If you get (tens of) thousands of people trying to get out of an area in less than 15 minutes, there's bound to be a lot of stupid things happening. This becomes especially important if you're going to do something like Friday night and think you can leap into rush hour traffic in a major metropolitan area and get anywhere anytime soon. Interstates became parking lots. The only reason hundreds of people were not killed in this tornado was because it dissipated before clearing out a mile of that traffic jam on 35. Back of the envelope calculations put about 1500 cars in that amount of space. Even with only one person in each car, that's 1500 people with essentially no shelter. This is a classic "not if, but when" scenario.

If you're not satisfied with your shelter, the time to abandon it is in the morning or early afternoon when there is plenty of time to reach a safe venue. Leaving then is completely fine, and if you are in really shaky shelter like mobile and manufactured homes, is probably preferable. But waiting for a warning in an urban area is too late. You're reducing your odds of survival, as counter-intuitive as it may sound. The problem is, I imagine the death rate will still be low on an absolute scale, which means many (most?) people will survive and think it was a good idea, perpetuating the myth. They'll never realize that more of them would have survived with a different strategy because people suck at statistics.

one question I have is how many were actually killed by the tornadoes on the road yesterday and how many were killed in accidents?

As far as I can know, none were accidents - other than, you know, the accident of getting picked up and flung by a tornado. On the fortunate side, where the storm did cross a freeway was in an area where I-40 had already been closed down, minimizing traffic in the area.

It is frightening to consider that mets (not all) are going with "if you're above ground, even in a shelter, in an EF4 or EF5 tornado, there is 0% chance of survival." Even if the chance of survival is only decent, play on it. You don't want people feeling completely helpless and deciding to do nothing as a result.

One thing that is certain, though, is that manufactured homes are bad regardless of the strength of the tornado.

In the article by Dr. Brooks he really harps on how those dramatic (and false!) statements are hurting things - some of the people he interviewed after 5/3/99 just shut down and did absolutely nothing to protect themselves, decreasing their odds of survival. Fortunately, those he surveyed that took no action still survived (obviously, hard to survey those who have died). In the long run, it may be expensive, but the best thing you can do to protect yourself is to install at least a safe room, or preferably below-ground shelter. There were numerous stories after the Newcastle-Moore tornado of people taking shelter in such places and emerging completely unharmed despite a destroyed house. It's next to useless since it's anecdotal evidence, but I know of several families personally who lost homes on the 20th, but I don't know a single person who was injured, even though one of the families had a daughter in one of the destroyed elementary schools.

We have to remember, too, that even in violent tornadoes, the area affected by EF4-EF5 winds are rather small. The majority of the area sees less, easily survivable damage.

[EF-5bigj]

Wow I was not expecting to see their names RIP.

[Infdidoll]

Wow I was not expecting to see their names RIP.

I'm incredibly choked up. I'm holding out hope that this article is wrong or false in some way because there has been no 'official' word yet, but a friend just shared it on Facebook. There are no words, if so. True pioneers of meteorological research.

[EF-5bigj]

Well I do not know what to say about this man this is just heartbreaking

[Texas Snowman]

In an unbelievable and ironic twist, there was this story about Tim right after the 5/20/13 Moore tornado:

http://m.nydailynews.com/1.1351627

[Infdidoll]

In an unbelievable and ironic twist, there was this story about Tim right after the 5/20/13 Moore tornado:

http://m.nydailynews.com/1.1351627

This is unreal. Looks like more sources are starting to confirm: http://www.examiner.com/article/discove ... no-tornado

I follow Dick McGowan, too, who said it was confirmed to him by trusted friends. What a heartbreaking day.