Significant Tornado Events

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Sort of off topic, but does anyone know some good ways/sources to find tornado damage photos? I'm talking search queries, methods, etc.

Flickr, imgr, FB, sometimes YouTube videos have lots of old photographs in a montage, newspapers.com and various state archives online are good too.
And of course TornadoTalk.

 

[HAwkmoon]

Just saw this, but it’s going much better! Going to have much more time after this semester is over to get back to work on it, but in the meantime I’ve been gathering some amazing resources.

I’ve been in touch with Tim Marshall and he was gracious enough to send me a USB drive of roughly 1000 incredibly high-quality photos from his survey on Greensburg. Haven’t really combed through all of them, but looked at the ~300 aerial photographs and it’s some pretty extreme stuff. Pretty much confirmed my thinking that Greensburg was right on par with Joplin and Parkersburg intensity-wise.

I am also going to try and get back in touch with a few of the mets at NWS Dodge City to get some more info on the post-Greensburg tornadoes. I got into contact with a few locals that claimed to have several photo albums from Trousdale and Hopewell, but haven’t heard back in a while unfortunately.

Do you have any interesting pictures from that USB, like of the homes rated EF5 that you are able to share?

 

[HAwkmoon]

Found this on Alabama state archives, a Guin damage aerial. Not the best quality sadly but you can see how narrow the core of extreme winds was with this thing and how extreme the wind-rowing of debris was:

View attachment 31857

Have you been able to locate any well-built homes in the Guin path?

 

[AJS]

The closest thing we’ve seen to the Tri-State tornado is the Western Kentucky tornado, no tornado has come as close to matching the length and duration to the Tri-State event before December 10, 2021.
Really the only thing stopping the Mayfield tornado from continuing longer was nearby thunderstorms that disrupted the supercell and the brief cycle period in Tennessee.
Both also had similar environments and interestingly occurred not far at all from each other, ~80 miles apart. However one major difference was the Tri-State tornado sustained EF4+ intensity for nearly all of its life and was much more intense and consistently wider than Mayfield.
Incredibly anomalous to one; have a tornado even travel that far to begin with, and two; have it maintain extremely violent intensity and be consistently massive for almost that entire time. Really nothing like it.

I know we all know that the Tri State was a lot more intense throughout its lifespan than the Mayfield tornado’s intensity was. However, I do feel like the damage in Bremen was really extreme and is in my opinion some of the most contextual damage we may have seen in a long time. Definitely since at least Vilonia.

 

[Western_KS_Wx]

Do you have any interesting pictures from that USB, like of the homes rated EF5 that you are able to share?

Yeah, I haven’t been able to save the ground photos just yet, I need to put it into a compressed folder but the file is absolutely massive and my drive space is a little low right now lol.

Here’s some aerials though.

These were the first homes to be struck south of town, some pretty gnarly wind-rowing can be seen through the field here. The core of the tornado passed 1/4 mile to the east of this location.


Here’s the first area of EF5 damage. The second home on the right and the home at top were both built just a year before the tornado.


Here’s the second area of EF5 damage, starting from bottom left to bottom right.


Third area where EF5 damage was found. At least one of these homes was given an EF5 rating, located 4 blocks west of the highschool.


Some other notable aerials of the town and homes that were EF5 candidates.






These are all just scratching the surface, as there are nearly 300 other aerials from virtually every part of the town.

 

[HAwkmoon]

Yeah, I haven’t been able to save the ground photos just yet, I need to put it into a compressed folder but the file is absolutely massive and my drive space is a little low right now lol.

Here’s some aerials though.

These were the first homes to be struck south of town, some pretty gnarly wind-rowing can be seen through the field here. The core of the tornado passed 1/4 mile to the east of this location.
View attachment 31875

Here’s the first area of EF5 damage. The second home on the right and the home at top were both built just a year before the tornado.
View attachment 31876

Here’s the second area of EF5 damage, starting from bottom left to bottom right.
View attachment 31877

Third area where EF5 damage was found. At least one of these homes was given an EF5 rating, located 4 blocks west of the highschool.
View attachment 31878

Some other notable aerials of the town and homes that were EF5 candidates.

View attachment 31880

View attachment 31882View attachment 31883View attachment 31884View attachment 31885
View attachment 31886

These are all just scratching the surface, as there are nearly 300 other aerials from virtually every part of the town.

These are extraordinary! For my tri-state article I have tried to include as many pictures as possible (I think its getting close to 800 now), but the size is a big issue lol. What is incredible is how rare these images are, I have never seen any of these anywhere. Truly incredible.

 

[Western_KS_Wx]

These are extraordinary! For my tri-state article I have tried to include as many pictures as possible (I think its getting close to 800 now), but the size is a big issue lol. What is incredible is how rare these images are, I have never seen any of these anywhere. Truly incredible.

I’m approaching 5,000 photos now on the Greensburg event as a whole, which like you said is a bit of an issue. Kind of hard to select some to put into the article when there’s that many. But yeah, when I was putting in the USB drive I felt like a kid in a candy store lol, cannot thank Tim Marshall enough! I’m really looking forward to your Tri-State article, been fascinated by that tornado ever since I first got into weather. Also, finding that many photos on such an old event is really impressive, can’t wait to see the finished product!

 

[HAwkmoon]

I’m approaching 5,000 photos now on the Greensburg event as a whole, which like you said is a bit of an issue. Kind of hard to select some to put into the article when there’s that many. But yeah, when I was putting in the USB drive I felt like a kid in a candy store lol, cannot thank Tim Marshall enough! I’m really looking forward to your Tri-State article, been fascinated by that tornado ever since I first got into weather. Also, finding that many photos on such an old event is really impressive, can’t wait to see the finished product!

Would you ever considering making a file for greensburg public? I was considering tri-state but as I said my main concern was size lol. It's tricky cause you want people to see the pictures but there are just so many.

 

[Western_KS_Wx]

Would you ever considering making a file for greensburg public? I was considering tri-state but as I said my main concern was size lol. It's tricky cause you want people to see the pictures but there are just so many.

I probably will once the article is done with, but again with the sheer number of them it’ll be a bit of a task to try and group them to where it’s shareable. I do have this Google Earth file where I plotted every damage point I could from Greensburg, I’ll have to go back and do some editing but I’ll post that here soon.

 

[HAwkmoon]

I probably will once the article is done with, but again with the sheer number of them it’ll be a bit of a task to try and group them to where it’s shareable. I do have this Google Earth file where I plotted every damage point I could from Greensburg, I’ll have to go back and do some editing but I’ll post that here soon.

Alright, man I am very excited to see your work lol. Incredible stuff. I know a lot of debate has gone on in the community as to whether older EF5s would still get their ratings today and with Greensburg lacking detailed information and pictures of EF5 damage it has been called under question. Love to see your article, I also noticed many homes and farms in the path of trousdale that seem to have been destroyed. Wondering if they were ever documented.

 

[TH2002]

@Western_KS_Wx First time I've seen wind rowing of that caliber from Greensburg, not to mention the aerials show just how complete of a wipeout the dense residential areas of town experienced. Remarkable stuff.
Also, is this the same home that's visible at the top of aerial 2?

 

[Western_KS_Wx]

@Western_KS_Wx First time I've seen wind rowing of that caliber from Greensburg, not to mention the aerials show just how complete of a wipeout the dense residential areas of town experienced. Remarkable stuff.
Also, is this the same home that's visible at the top of aerial 2?

That is the same home yes, pretty well-built and from what I’ve heard was just completed when the storm hit. There was also some pretty noticeable wind-rowing, granulation, and scouring when the storm exited town as well.



As for the wipeout, the sheer width of the devastation is just mind boggling. There was near-EF5 damage along the north side of US-400 spaced out nearly 1/2 mile. These aerials are pretty incredible.


Really is an absolute miracle the death toll wasn’t on par with Udall, and honestly some of that was just pure luck.

with Greensburg lacking detailed information and pictures of EF5 damage it has been called under question.

Right, I still think it’s definitely one of the more underrated EF5’s, but there really is hardly any photographs of the most extreme damage from the event available online. The complexity of the damage at times is a bit misleading as well.

I also noticed many homes and farms in the path of trousdale that seem to have been destroyed. Wondering if they were ever documented.

Yeah, some of those farms were left virtually untouched since 2007, I do have photographs of them however. Here’s one of them:

 

[slenker]

Right, I still think it’s definitely one of the more underrated EF5’s, but there really is hardly any photographs of the most extreme damage from the event available online. The complexity of the damage at times is a bit misleading as well.

It is sort of strange that people don’t talk about it as much as the others, seeing as this was the widest EF5 and it swallowed a town while at night, which is terrifying. It’s also underrated in my opinion because of the fact that it was occluding while doing this damage, meaning it was likely weakening going through Greensburg. All those tornadoes produced by that cell that night were absolute monsters for sure.

This was discussed earlier in the thread, but the difference in strength between the EF5s (and with how storms are rated now, even a good amount of HE EF4s) is very marginal. While Smithville was definitely stronger than Greensburg, it wasn’t really that much stronger - their strengths are really separated by a hair. And at its peak intensity we really don’t know if Greensburg or Trousdale was more intense than some of the 4/27/2011 EF5’s, they very well could have been.

Edit: I will say I do believe Jarrell, Pampa, Bakersfield Valley or Tri-State were the only tornadoes that I could buy being much stronger than some of the EF5s we’ve had.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

It is sort of strange that people don’t talk about it as much as the others, seeing as this was the widest EF5 and it swallowed a town while at night, which is terrifying. It’s also underrated in my opinion because of the fact that it was occluding while doing this damage, meaning it was likely weakening going through Greensburg. All those tornadoes produced by that cell that night were absolute monsters for sure.

This was discussed earlier in the thread, but the difference in strength between the EF5s (and with how storms are rated now, even a good amount of HE EF4s) is very marginal. While Smithville was definitely stronger than Greensburg, it wasn’t really that much stronger - their strengths are really separated by a hair. And at its peak intensity we really don’t know if Greensburg or Trousdale was more intense than some of the 4/27/2011 EF5’s, they very well could have been.

Also, the fact that Greensburg was occluding is likely the reason the death toll was low, if it hit at maximum strength it'd be Udall-level fatalities, easily.
Also, Greensburg and Smithville are NOWHERE near comparable, Smithville was moving in excess of 60 mph and did even more extreme than Greensburg did in mere seconds.

 

[slenker]

Also, the fact that Greensburg was occluding is likely the reason the death toll was low, if it hit at maximum strength it'd be Udall-level fatalities, easily.
Also, Greensburg and Smithville are NOWHERE near comparable, Smithville was moving in excess of 60 mph and did even more extreme than Greensburg did in mere seconds.

They’re definitely comparable. I believe forward speed in a tornado moving that quickly is capable of aiding the tornado in damaging things. I still believe out of the 9 rated EF5s that Smithville is the most intense, but the sledgehammer effect is most certainly a thing. The windspeeds on the right side of the core are catching up to the tornadoes translational movement, so that needs to be taken into account. Smithville moving at ~65 mph going through town adds a flat +65 mph wind to the right side, and if the tornado contained windspeeds of 250 mph, then that’s a ~315 mph windspeed on the right side of the vortex. That sort of power will most certainly take no time at all to do absurd damage, and it shouldn’t be held against the storm either. It’s a feature that aided in its power.

Additionally, slow movement speed also no doubt helps. Increased exposure time means more intense damage. That is not a debate. However, with that being said, I do have some reason to believe that a lot of the most violent damage an EF4+ tornado inflicts occurs very quickly after a tornado strikes, and some DI’s we see as EF5 are more exaggerated in slower tornadoes rather than quicker ones. We’ve seen tornadoes like the Bowdle EF4 (some chasers believe it was at EF5 strength) meander and move very slowly, yet it didn’t do anything near what a tornado like Jarrell did. It’s incredibly interesting to see the role tornadic translational speed plays in damage from violent tornadoes, because it really does seem like slower ones cause worse debarking and vehicle damage, while quicker ones tend to “rip” things more violently and have more intense windrowing, at least from what I can tell.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

They’re definitely comparable. I believe forward speed in a tornado moving that quickly is capable of aiding the tornado in damaging things. I still believe out of the 9 rated EF5s that Smithville is the most intense, but the sledgehammer effect is most certainly a thing. The windspeeds on the right side of the core are catching up to the tornadoes translational movement, so that needs to be taken into account. Smithville moving at ~65 mph going through town adds a flat +65 mph wind to the right side, and if the tornado contained windspeeds of 250 mph, then that’s a ~315 mph windspeed on the right side of the vortex. That sort of power will most certainly take no time at all to do absurd damage, and it shouldn’t be held against the storm either. It’s a feature that aided in its power.

Additionally, slow movement speed also no doubt helps. Increased exposure time means more intense damage. That is not a debate. However, with that being said, I do have some reason to believe that a lot of the most violent damage an EF4+ tornado inflicts occurs very quickly after a tornado strikes, and some DI’s we see as EF5 are more exaggerated in slower tornadoes rather than quicker ones. We’ve seen tornadoes like the Bowdle EF4 (some chasers believe it was at EF5 strength) meander and move very slowly, yet it didn’t do anything near what a tornado like Jarrell did. It’s incredibly interesting to see the role tornadic translational speed plays in damage from violent tornadoes, because it really does seem like slower ones cause worse debarking and vehicle damage, while quicker ones tend to “rip” things more violently and have more intense windrowing, at least from what I can tell.

The stuff about the sledgehammer with Smithville...that doesn't explain the ground scouring with that thing. The fact it managed to do that kind of ground scouring while moving along that quickly is incredible.
Slow and fast movement....yeah, this is an interesting issue. Bowdle hardly did any damage while moving slower than Jarrell yet Jarrell did arguably the most violent tornado damage ever photographed.
That said, I do wonder about Greensburg and Trousdale while they were over open country, so I get where you're coming from. I'd love to have photographs of the areas they were over before they hit towns or farms, to see how much ground scouring they did over open country.

 

[slenker]

The stuff about the sledgehammer with Smithville...that doesn't explain the ground scouring with that thing. The fact it managed to do that kind of ground scouring while moving along that quickly is incredible.
Slow and fast movement....yeah, this is an interesting issue. Bowdle hardly did any damage while moving slower than Jarrell yet Jarrell did arguably the most violent tornado damage ever photographed.
That said, I do wonder about Greensburg and Trousdale while they were over open country, so I get where you're coming from. I'd love to have photographs of the areas they were over before they hit towns or farms, to see how much ground scouring they did over open country.

I definitely should have stated it more clearly; I still put Smithville as (quite easily too) the most violent tornado we’ve seen in the past 20 years because of the fact it did that stuff while it was moving so quickly. I still believe Smithville had that effect aiding it it’s power, but even taking that into account doesn’t explain everything, I fully agree with that. It was also clearly in an extraordinary environment, it was working with >900 m2/s2 of SRH which is unreal.

 

[TH2002]

Yeah, I haven’t been able to save the ground photos just yet, I need to put it into a compressed folder but the file is absolutely massive and my drive space is a little low right now lol.

Here’s some aerials though.

These were the first homes to be struck south of town, some pretty gnarly wind-rowing can be seen through the field here. The core of the tornado passed 1/4 mile to the east of this location.
View attachment 31875

Here’s the first area of EF5 damage. The second home on the right and the home at top were both built just a year before the tornado.
View attachment 31876

Here’s the second area of EF5 damage, starting from bottom left to bottom right.
View attachment 31877

Third area where EF5 damage was found. At least one of these homes was given an EF5 rating, located 4 blocks west of the highschool.
View attachment 31878

Some other notable aerials of the town and homes that were EF5 candidates.

View attachment 31880

View attachment 31882View attachment 31883View attachment 31884View attachment 31885
View attachment 31886

These are all just scratching the surface, as there are nearly 300 other aerials from virtually every part of the town.

Also, have to ask: do you have any ground level views of the homes in the bottom right of aerial #3 and the bottom left in aerial #4?

 

[TH2002]

The stuff about the sledgehammer with Smithville...that doesn't explain the ground scouring with that thing. The fact it managed to do that kind of ground scouring while moving along that quickly is incredible.
Slow and fast movement....yeah, this is an interesting issue. Bowdle hardly did any damage while moving slower than Jarrell yet Jarrell did arguably the most violent tornado damage ever photographed.
That said, I do wonder about Greensburg and Trousdale while they were over open country, so I get where you're coming from. I'd love to have photographs of the areas they were over before they hit towns or farms, to see how much ground scouring they did over open country.

To be fair, some of the damage Bowdle produced was actually extremely impressive. Transmission towers and vehicles were mangled with one tower being thrown 400 yards over a hill, trees were completely debarked, and grass was scoured to bare soil in some areas.

 

[AJS]

That is the same home yes, pretty well-built and from what I’ve heard was just completed when the storm hit. There was also some pretty noticeable wind-rowing, granulation, and scouring when the storm exited town as well.
View attachment 31887
View attachment 31888

As for the wipeout, the sheer width of the devastation is just mind boggling. There was near-EF5 damage along the north side of US-400 spaced out nearly 1/2 mile. These aerials are pretty incredible.
View attachment 31889View attachment 31890View attachment 31891View attachment 31892

Really is an absolute miracle the death toll wasn’t on par with Udall, and honestly some of that was just pure luck.


Right, I still think it’s definitely one of the more underrated EF5’s, but there really is hardly any photographs of the most extreme damage from the event available online. The complexity of the damage at times is a bit misleading as well.

Yeah, some of those farms were left virtually untouched since 2007, I do have photographs of them however. Here’s one of them:
View attachment 31895
View attachment 31894

I know this’ll probably be a silly question to ask lol, but based on your research, where do you happen to believe the Greensburg tornado reached its maximum intensity? By the way, you have done an absolutely incredible job on uncovering hidden or lost gems showcasing the true violence/strength of this monster. I cannot wait for you’re final project to be completed!