• Welcome to TalkWeather!
    We see you lurking around TalkWeather! Take the extra step and join us today to view attachments, see less ads and maybe even join the discussion.
    CLICK TO JOIN TALKWEATHER

Enhanced Fujita Ratings Debate Thread

Honestly, as horrible as the event was, it's a miracle it moved through the southern portions of Somerset and London; if it had been a bit north a lot more people would have been in the path.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AJS
Maxis_s said:
It's still so incredibly stupid that one survey team found EF5 damage and they still just ignored it and decided to not rate it EF5. I still don't know the context behind that decision.
Click to expand...
It tossed a 36 ton rail car further than any railcar has ever been tossed (400 feet), and tore apart a 150 foot tall bridge trestle and lifted it 100 feet up hill. Truly wild.

1747927780987.jpeg
 
  • Like
Reactions: AJS
Suspend your disbelief for a moment and Imagine if no hurricane in the last 12 years had received a category 5 rating. People would assume hurricanes were getting weaker, and it wouldn't even be an illogical conclusion. Building practices would slowly change in this new "reality", and you'd start seeing lower quality neighborhoods being built by cheap real estate firms and contractors. People would actually move into those homes because to them, there's no reason not to.

Eventually a storm with 150+ mph winds would hit that area and completely devastate those neighborhoods. It might be years, or even decades before that area is hit, but it will happen eventually. Now imagine if the poor build quality of those homes was used as justification for the category 5 drought, and when older homes were hit, their old age justified it some more. The drought would continue, and people would keep on living in this false, non Cat 5 reality. one by one, over the course of several years, coastal communities would be hit, and be totally shocked by the devastation.

This is the current reality of tornado ratings. They're stronger than ever, but weaker houses than ever keep getting built. Particle board sheeting, vinyl (plastic) siding and windows, thin nails driven too deep by over-pressurized nail guns, etc. There's no code enforcement and no community storm shelters. Oh, and the current de-facto leader of tornado surveys is employed by one of the largest engineering consulting firms in the country.
 
Just thought I'd ask this, which I'm sure has been asked a lot, but do you guys think we will ever get another EF5? I used to believe that we would at some point, but I'm starting to believe, especially after the Plevna tornado and how strong it was, that there will never be another EF5 tornado again.
 
US_Highway15 said:
Just thought I'd ask this, which I'm sure has been asked a lot, but do you guys think we will ever get another EF5? I used to believe that we would at some point, but I'm starting to believe, especially after the Plevna tornado and how strong it was, that there will never be another EF5 tornado again.
Click to expand...
We will. It will be a very destructive tornado in an office like Jackson, Norman, Paducah, etc, most likely, or else a storm so strong even the conservative offices can't rate it EF4.

(Also Plevna is a bad EF5 example. That tornado was definitely EF4 but did not produce any EF5 contextual damage. Grinnell is your EF5 from that outbreak.)
 
US_Highway15 said:
Just thought I'd ask this, which I'm sure has been asked a lot, but do you guys think we will ever get another EF5? I used to believe that we would at some point, but I'm starting to believe, especially after the Plevna tornado and how strong it was, that there will never be another EF5 tornado again.
Click to expand...
Nowhere soon, but yes. The drought will end at some point, and I theorize that offices will be flooded with liberal surveyors, who like us, hate the current scale. Many, many people in high school and college in the Wx community hate the scale, and those are the people that will change it.
 
Time to judge every tornado listed in the posts on pg. 102. The Official Judgement on the 2013-2025 Violent Tornadoes:

tornado examiner said:
Cookeville High end EF4 was the right call
Bassfield EF5 solely for the tree damage, that shack was not well built in the slightest. It had a tin roof and some other problems I can't remember
Ashby Not sure where I stand on this one
Monette Like Bassfield, EF5 solely for the tree damage
Mayfield EF5 mainly for contextuals and 2 specific DIs - the church in Mayfield and the CMU Slab Imposter in Bremen
Black creek EF4, due to the homes hit being CMU. It was the closest 2022 got to an EF5 candidate, though EDIT: Actually, the homes were well built, but I'm still going EF4 because of the lack of violent contextuals
Rolling fork EF5 based off the Family Dollar. It's worth noting that Jackson did a perfect survey in the bounds of the current EF scale, it's the upcoming revision that makes this DI EF5 damage
Matador EF5 and one of the top 5 strongest tornadoes ever. I don't think any tornado has ever made mesquite trees disappear entirely before, and that confirmed the worst about this tornado. There also was a genuine EF5 house in town, proven by @buckeye05
Barnsdall EF4 was the appropriate rating
Greenfield EF5 solely off the windspeed and MAYBE the parking stops. EF4 otherwise
Sterling city EF5 for the contextuals
Diaz EF4, the one house it slabbed wasn't fully swept clean and the contextuals weren't as violent as you'd expect
Lake city EF4, didn't see any extreme contextual to justify EF5. EF3 is way too low though
London EF4, I'd swap the windspeeds of this and Marion
Grinnel EF5 for the contextuals
And plevna EF4, there doesn't seem to have been extreme EF5 contextuals like there was in Grinnell
Click to expand...
AJS said:
Vilonia EF5 and blatantly so
Rochelle EF5 mainly at the sidewalk house. It's disheartening seeing how fast the main players of the WX community are throwing this one out when it was slam dunk EF5
Chapman EF5 for the railroad damage and a Oak Grove esque DI
Camp Crook EF5 for damage at the farm
Click to expand...
Grand Poo Bah said:
Washington EF5
Goldsby EF5
Chickasha EF5
Tuscaloosa EF5
Louisville EF5
Pilger EF5, along with the other Pilger twin, Stanton, and perhaps Wakefield
Click to expand...

You also forgot such hits as New Wren, Holly Springs (both had EF5 damage missed by MEG), Funing (rated EF4 because the CMA stated that EF5s don't exist in China, apparently), Alpena, and more.
 
Last edited:
Lake Martin EF4 said:
Time to judge every tornado listed in the posts on pg. 102. The Official Judgement on the 2013-2025 Violent Tornadoes:





You also forgot such hits as New Wren, Holly Springs (both had EF5 damage missed by MEG), Funing (rated EF4 because the CMA stated that EF5s don't exist in China, apparently), Alpena, and more.
Click to expand...
Major correction, every slabbed home from black creek was a concrete slab with properly installed bolts. And good construction overall. Contextuals were what prevented an EF5 with that one.

I’d like to see what the EF5 house was in matador, can buckeye elaborate?
But yeah. Otherwise true but still…perhaps all of those could have proved to be higher end tornadoes.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AJS
US_Highway15 said:
Just thought I'd ask this, which I'm sure has been asked a lot, but do you guys think we will ever get another EF5? I used to believe that we would at some point, but I'm starting to believe, especially after the Plevna tornado and how strong it was, that there will never be another EF5 tornado again.
Click to expand...

My last remaining shreds of optimism says it could happen. Especially with some of the great surveying we've seen from a few offices this year. However, I don't think it's likely. We've had two dozen EF5 candidates over the last 12 years all over the country and none of them have been rated as such. Some of those candidates achieved some truly incredible, never before seen damage, and top the all-time list of absolute monsters. Believing things are suddenly going to change unprompted is naive.

I don't think houses will ever be rated EF5 again, and if not them, then what? It seems the scale isn't really designed to reach EF5 with any other indicator. Sure, we have shopping malls, institutional buildings, high rises, and mid rises, but we've seen 2 of those 4 DIs take critical damage and still not get rated EF5. I'm not sure any office has the capability to rate those structures anyways. I also think the current mental leap required to go from 190 mph EF4 to 205 mph EF5 is astronomical, and even the best offices don't have the guts to make that call, or possibly even the authority.

The only way I see things changing is with a new Fujita like figure stepping up and having the leadership skills to take control and enact lasting change. It's going to be hard to dethrone Tim Marshall with the amount of campaigning he does. Seems like every amateur weather nerd has met him or talked to him at some point and likes him.

TL;DR

No. We will never see another EF5 within this current system. There's a better chance we go back to the original F scale or implement an entirely new system, than a tornado achieving a maximum rating on the EF scale.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AJS
Grand Poo Bah said:
My last remaining shreds of optimism says it could happen. Especially with some of the great surveying we've seen from a few offices this year. However, I don't think it's likely. We've had two dozen EF5 candidates over the last 12 years all over the country and none of them have been rated as such. Some of those candidates achieved some truly incredible, never before seen damage, and top the all-time list of absolute monsters. Believing things are suddenly going to change unprompted is naive.

I don't think houses will ever be rated EF5 again, and if not them, then what? It seems the scale isn't really designed to reach EF5 with any other indicator. Sure, we have shopping malls, institutional buildings, high rises, and mid rises, but we've seen 2 of those 4 DIs take critical damage and still not get rated EF5. I'm not sure any office has the capability to rate those structures anyways. I also think the current mental leap required to go from 190 mph EF4 to 205 mph EF5 is astronomical, and even the best offices don't have the guts to make that call, or possibly even the authority.

The only way I see things changing is with a new Fujita like figure stepping up and having the leadership skills to take control and enact lasting change. It's going to be hard to dethrone Tim Marshall with the amount of campaigning he does. Seems like every amateur weather nerd has met him or talked to him at some point and likes him.

TL;DR

No. We will never see another EF5 within this current system. There's a better chance we go back to the original F scale or implement an entirely new system, than a tornado achieving a maximum rating on the EF scale.
Click to expand...
We're due for another tornado to slab the excrement out of Moore, that'll be the droughtbreaker
 
tornado examiner said:
I thought all of the homes from matador were indeed unanchored and poorly constructed but if there was one that wasn’t then that’s even more infuriating.
Click to expand...
buckeye05 said:
I don’t have one saved unfortunately. It was a basement foundation home with anchor bolts.

Edit: I take that back. I do have one. Does it look like perfect construction? No. But it is poured concrete, anchor bolting is present, the subfloor is gone, and the concrete stemwall is actually broken. I could also settle for very high-end EF4 too, but in my opinion, it’s a rare situation like Rainsville where there’s just enough evidence for EF5 even though the foundation could be better quality. In this case, the contextual damage tells the story more accurately than the construction.
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top