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Discussion of February 5, 2008 Outbreak

Lake Martin EF4

Lake Martin EF4

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Good afternoon,

I haven't seen a lot of Super Tuesday discussion so I thought it'd be appropriate to make a thread for it.

For starters in this video at 1:04 I found a bit where if you brighten it enough you can actually see the Jackson EF4 in the darkness:
jacksontncontrastjacked.jpg

Does anyone else have anything interesting to share about this event?

EDIT: I also found this video that shows the precursor funnel cloud to the Castalian Springs EF3 that was the deadliest of the outbreak.
Screenshot 2022-12-19 at 18-56-03 Nashville Tornado News Clip - YouTube.png
 
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If there’s one tornado that fascinates me the most from this outbreak, it would have to be the Savannah, TN EF4. The destruction that occurred at the Sharon Baptist Church and School is probably some of the most violent damage to institutional buildings I’ve seen since the implementation of the EF scale. The church itself was very large, and was totally obliterated with large metal support beams sheared off or ripped out of the foundation, which was partially swept clean. A large school building was also destroyed, with large portions of building being flattened. NWS Memphis used to have some pretty incredible damage photos available, but thanks to their inability to make thorough documentation of historic tornado events in their area a priority, they are now gone as of last time I checked.
 
buckeye05 said:
If there’s one tornado that fascinates me the most from this outbreak, it would have to be the Savannah, TN EF4. The destruction that occurred at the Sharon Baptist Church and School is probably some of the most violent damage to institutional buildings I’ve seen since the implementation of the EF scale. The church itself was very large, and was totally obliterated with large metal support beams sheared off or ripped out of the foundation, which was partially swept clean. A large school building was also destroyed, with large portions of building being flattened. NWS Memphis used to have some pretty incredible damage photos available, but thanks to their inability to make thorough documentation of historic tornado events in their area a priority, they are now gone as of last time I checked.
Click to expand...

Pictures from the Savannah Tennessee area of some of the devastation from the tornadoes that ripped through the state early on Feb. 6th, 2008; and thanks to the very careing Realtors and member of Active Rain, by Liz Carter

Thanks to a couple of very special member of the Active Rain network I found out I needed to call and check on my family in Tennessee. I normally have ...
activerain.com activerain.com
 
Lake Martin EF4 said:

Pictures from the Savannah Tennessee area of some of the devastation from the tornadoes that ripped through the state early on Feb. 6th, 2008; and thanks to the very careing Realtors and member of Active Rain, by Liz Carter

Thanks to a couple of very special member of the Active Rain network I found out I needed to call and check on my family in Tennessee. I normally have ...
activerain.com activerain.com
Click to expand...
Good pics, but none show the church and school unfortunately.
 
The church:


Other damage:
my.firefighternation.com

Larry Jarnagin's Photos

Larry Jarnagin's Photos | Firefighter Nation is the social network for firefighters, rescue & EMS, connecting fire departments, firefighters & first re…
my.firefighternation.com my.firefighternation.com
melzmidnightbrew.wordpress.com

Pictures of tornado-damaged Savannah, TN (Sharon Baptist Church)

Mike, the kids, & I went out this morning to take pics of the damage done by the tornado last night. It’s really heartbreaking, but fortunately there were only two people (a couple praying) at …
melzmidnightbrew.wordpress.com melzmidnightbrew.wordpress.com

EDIT: Threw together a quick Google My Map of the track (comparing official and actual) as well as the church and school locations.
www.google.com

Savannah, TN tornado February 5, 2008 - Google My Maps

Savannah, TN tornado February 5, 2008
www.google.com www.google.com
 
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This to me was the modern-day benchmark for a verified high risk outbreak, until 4/27 came along and blasted everything else out of the water, skewing everyone's perception ever since.

That Arkansas tornado is one of those enigmatic events that seems like it belongs many decades earlier. I wonder if it was as powerful as Vilonia. Unlike the later tornado, I don't think there are any clear examples of overlooked/downplayed EF5 damage. Just its very long track and the parameter space that day suggest it was likely quite violent and probably capable of EF5 damage at some point, but that's all that can be said.

A day very worthy of a historical deep dive and gripping blow-by-blow account, but researching and organizing all that information would be just as grueling as it was for 5/31/85.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk
 
CheeselandSkies said:
This to me was the modern-day benchmark for a verified high risk outbreak, until 4/27 came along and blasted everything else out of the water, skewing everyone's perception ever since.

That Arkansas tornado is one of those enigmatic events that seems like it belongs many decades earlier. I wonder if it was as powerful as Vilonia. Unlike the later tornado, I don't think there are any clear examples of overlooked/downplayed EF5 damage. Just its very long track and the parameter space that day suggest it was likely quite violent and probably capable of EF5 damage at some point, but that's all that can be said.

A day very worthy of a historical deep dive and gripping blow-by-blow account, but researching and organizing all that information would be just as grueling as it was for 5/31/85.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
I don’t think Clinton was as strong as Vilonia but it was probably the 2nd strongest AR tornado of the 21st century.
 
Just noticed this on the event Wikipedia page, but this event was the deadliest U.S. tornado outbreak since 5/31/85, until 4/27. Surpassing even such infamous days as 4/26/91, 5/3/99 and 5/4/03. However, despite that, just to reinforce how far out of every other league 4/27 was, it had two single-tornado death tolls greater than this entire outbreak.
 
Despite only being an EF3, why did the Castilian Springs, Tennessee tornado end up being the deadliest of the Super Tuesday Outbreak?
 
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