Meanwhile, a cold front was tracking across the Midwest. We flew over Kane which was directly hit. These scales the Fujita scale, the Enhanced Fujita scale, the International Fujita scale, and the TORRO tornado intensity scale attempt to estimate the intensity of a tornado by classifying the damage caused to natural features and man-made structures in the tornado's path. "If I'm going to die, I'm not going to die alone," I said to myself, and off I ran to my neighbor's home. I never, ever forgot that moment. An Historical Look at F/EF5 Tornadoes | Weather Underground Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph. The cell speed of the storms was from the west at about 50 knots. Every tree was twisted, splintered, and covered with mud. I then rode in the PSP helicopter with him as we toured the areas near Dempseytown in Venango County that were hard hit by a tornado. It is described as a "possible" F5. ANOTHER TORNADO SOUTH OF SPARTANSBURG MOVING INTO WARREN COUNTY AND ONE NORTH OF OIL CITY MOVING INTO NORTHERN FOREST COUNTY. They had their hunting camp in Clearfield County near Parker Dam State Park. According to the NWS Cleveland, OH (2019), before the NWS WSR 88-Doppler Radar, radar operators hand drew the radar echos on overlay maps. This tornado is only listed as an F5 by the NCDC Technical Memorandum, and is not listed at all by Grazulis or any other sources, and is therefore a possible typographical error in the memorandum. They want you back in, she shouted over the mower. On May 31, 1985 I was graduate student in meteorology at Penn State, a member of the Penn State Campus Weather Service, and just six days past my debut as weekend meteorologist for the summer on WNEP-TV in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. This event was the deadliest tornado outbreak of the 1980's; killing 89 people in total, injuring more than 1,000 others, and racking up more than $600 million in property damage. I recall being impressed by the very rapid development of the individual cumulonimbus clouds along two separate bands --- and the rapid spread of the storm anvils. Created by: Maria Chairmonte December 15, 2022 The day was May 31, 1985. Alabama and Oklahoma have recorded the greatest number of tornadoes with a rating of 5 on the Fujita/Enhanced Fujita Scale, each with seven such . Officially rated high-end F4, though one survey revealed potential F5 damage. I requested that I would like to see the damage from the air as soon as possible. Homes were swept away, with only a bathtub remaining on one of the foundations. In all, 16 people died in this area. This is the story behind the F5 tornado. The morning of May 31st featured a great dealof electricity around the office. This is the earliest estimated F5 that can be verified in the U.S. according to Grazulis. Timber losses totaled 100 million. A car was thrown a block and a half. About then the bell started ringing in the teletype room as each new tornado warning was issued. 5:45 pm EDT - Tornado Warning During my entire career, I have only worked one weather event that involved a F5 tornado, that being the April 8, 1998 outbreak in Alabama. This tornado impacted several farms, including one where a "fine new residence" was swept completely away. As noted in several summaries of this outbreak, including the official NWS damage assessment report, (NOAA/NWS October 1985): Perhaps the lesson to be learned from the 1985 outbreak is that under the proper atmospheric conditions, major tornadoes can occur irrespective of the location or terrain.. Phone calls and people saying that tornados were hitting all around us. Please Contact Us. By the end of the evening, a total of forty-one tornadoes had occurred in the United States and Canada. An ATM surveillance camera at the First State Bank in Parkersburg, Iowa, shows a house across the street being hit by an EF5 tornado with estimated winds of . REMEMBERA TORNADO WATCH MEANS CONDITIONSARE FAVORABLE FOR TORNADOES AND SEVERETHUNDERSTORMS IN AND CLOSE TO THE WATCH AREA. Tragically, three or four people were killed (I think a man living in mobile home and two teenagers out in the woods), but I was amazed at how many were not hurt after viewing the destruction. Remembering Pennsylvania's deadliest tornado outbreak, 34 years ago As mentioned earlier, wind shear, or more importantly wind shear of the right magnitude and direction, will cause thunderstorms to rotate, which is a precursor to tornado development. 1974 Xenia tornado - Wikipedia TORRO rated the tornado T10. At the time of the call, I did not know who Greg was, or that he had been one of the few PhD candidates of Dr Ted Fujita. The entire trip took approximately 90 minutes and the amount of destruction and loss as viewed from the air was unbelievable. This depicts 2800 J/kg of CAPE in the vicinity, therefore indicating a moderate to high value of instability in the atmosphere for severe thunderstorms. Farms were leveled and a truck was thrown 300yd (274m). White tornados because they were so full of debris. That was the day I found my calling. The company gave $100,000 for a borough disaster fund and the other $50,000 established a Valley Baptist Church Rebuilding Fund. The orange shading in the following 850 mb chart (from Markowski) shows where winds were greater than 40Kts (46MPH). Homes were swept away, and a boxcar was thrown 100yd (300ft). A well-built home shouldn't be at risk, but a tornado of this intensity might be capable of moving a mobile home or caravan. This is a map and list of tornadoes since 1950 which the National Weather Service has rated F5 (before 2007) or EF5 (equivalent, 2007 onward, the most intense damage category on the Fujita and Enhanced Fujita damage scales. Below is a timeline of actual National Weather Service text from northwest Pennsylvania on May 31st: BULLETIN ACTIVATE EBS TORNADO WARNING NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ERIE PA 513 PM EDT FRI MAY 31 1985 EXPIRES 530 PMCOUNTIES AFFECTED PA ERIETHE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN ERIE HAS ISSUED A TORNADO WARNING UNTIL 530 PM FOR THESE COUNTIES IN NORTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIASOUTHERN ERIEA TORNADO WAS SIGHTED BY STATE POLICE NEAR PENNSIDESOUTH OF ALBION IN ERIE COUNTY AT 505 PMMOVING TOWARD THE NORTHEAST AT 30 MILES AN HOUR. It's far from clear what I'd be doing right now had it not been for the 5/31/85 tornado outbreak (and also perhaps had we not learned about tornadoes in school just before the outbreak). PORTIONS OF EASTERN OHIO to along the middle Atlantic Coast then westward through North Carolina by Saturday morning June 1st. Hurricane Camille in 1969 down in Mississippi, and I saw Hurricane Agnes in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. I heard a rumor. Chance Haynes from NWS in. The tornado finally lifted near Tionesta (Forest County) after destroying 371 homes. I will never forget the evening of May 31, 1985 and the events that occurred that night and during the next several weeks as the area of northwestern Pennsylvania where I live experienced a severe outbreak of several deadly tornadoes. With vast landmasses beneath subtropical, moisture-laden air surging from the Gulf of Mexico and its polar opposite sagging from Canada, the United States is a world capital of tornadoes. Of these twenty-one, one was rated an F5, and six were rated F4s. Acres of ground were "swept bare" in some parts of town. I took a quick dinner break and returned before the storms got into the coverage area of our radio stations. Many other tornadoes have never been formally rated by an official government source but have nonetheless been described as F5/EF5/T10+ or equivalent, often by independent studies.
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