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Significant Tornado Events

Aaron Rider said:
Vilonia was so absurdly violent I'd consider a hunger strike to force an upgrade of the rating.

I exaggerate.

Somewhat.
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Oh, believe me, if i was American and ran for president, my slogan would be "Vilonia was a EF5."

Essentially, on a serious note, I've referred to just getting my mind used to Vilonia being a EF5, instead of going down the (justified) crashout route being reminded of how laughable the survey was.
 
WeathermanLeprechaun said:
Oh, believe me, if i was American and ran for president, my slogan would be "Vilonia was a EF5."

Essentially, on a serious note, I've referred to just getting my mind used to Vilonia being a EF5, instead of going down the (justified) crashout route being reminded of how laughable the survey was.
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Yeah. My policy is this - in any other tornado with a disputed rating, my language would be along the lines of "I personally think this tornado was..." or "In my books, this tornado was..."

Not so with Vilonia. Whenever I mention its rating, I WILL call it an EF5, no "by my analysis" or "in my eyes", just "The 4/27/14 Vilonia EF5..." The most clear cut non-officially rated EF5 case of the entire 21st century, and perhaps even of all time.
 
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WeathermanLeprechaun said:
Total wipeout with extreme contextual damage too. Just very impressive.
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Still utterly insane to me that not a single house/structure in that third image was surveyed and/or given a DI. There are very few tornadoes on record that essentially wipe every home in their direct path from their foundation over a relatively long distance. Vilonia is one of them.
 
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When I was younger I casually glossed over Vilonia because of the EF4 rating. I even watched the live coverage while it was happening and thought yea violent tornado.

But it wasn't until I found this server years later where I realized it was WELL into the EF5 range!
 
andyhb said:
Still utterly insane to me that not a single house/structure in that third image was surveyed and/or given a DI. There are very few tornadoes on record that essentially wipe every home in their direct path from their foundation over a relatively long distance. Vilonia is one of them.
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Goes to show how truly sloppy and lackluster effort was put into it. Documentation and accuracy matters, and for a historic tornado in Arkansas/all time standards, they rate it high end EF4 and don't even survey rows of houses. It's, as I've said, truly laughable.
 
WeathermanLeprechaun said:
I don't think it's unreasonable to put Vilonia in perhaps up there with some of the most violent ever. The damage caused was nothing short of extraordinary, in practically all aspects.
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I very much agree. Especially considering the tornado was relatively fast moving as well. Honestly, it joins the ranks with the Super Outbreak 2011 EF5s on my eyes - not that much separates the Vilonia damage from Smithville damage. 100% deserves a spot in some sort of 'most violent tornadoes' list.

In further reflection, its quite interesting how the early 2010s ended up being an extremely violent period of tornado history. I can think of numerous tornadoes 2011-2014 that are contenders for most violent tornadoes.
 
joshoctober16 said:
right image is indeed one of the areas that could have EF5 damage.

View attachment 48732
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There’s more potential for EF5 than what that purple contour shows. Literally any bare slab along that street is an EF5 candidate. Problem is, that entire street was skipped during the survey, so we don’t have any construction details to go on. With that said, it’s pretty unlikely that there wasn’t a single properly bolted home at that location.
 
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buckeye05 said:
There’s more potential for EF5 than what that purple contour shows. Literally any bare slab along that street is an EF5 candidate. Problem is, that entire street was skipped during the survey, so we don’t have any construction details to go on. With that said, it’s pretty unlikely that there wasn’t a single properly bolted home at that location.
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the blue outline is more of solid EF5 damage outline area.

here is a more outline version.

Red = EF4
Pink = EF4 or EF5 but more likely EF4
Purple = EF4 or EF5 but more likely EF5
Blue = EF5
1763634220695.png

there are other areas to look more into like these 2.

1763634366837.png
 
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