Enhanced Fujita Ratings Debate Thread

[Grand Poo Bah]

I know Reddit can be a cesspool, but recently people are creating posts there that Smithville was the only tornado that was an actual EF-5 that day, and that the other three, particularly HPC, should be downgraded. I would argue that it is more likely that there were MORE tornadoes that day that were capable of EF-5 damage at some point.

Yeah, similar sentiment about downplaying tornadoes has been in here too. It's amazing that the first EF5 in 12 years seems to have spawned such a large community of contrarians.

 

[TH2002]

I know Reddit can be a cesspool, but recently people are creating posts there that Smithville was the only tornado that was an actual EF-5 that day, and that the other three, particularly HPC, should be downgraded. I would argue that it is more likely that there were MORE tornadoes that day that were capable of EF-5 damage at some point.

And now you see why.

 

[speedbump305]

I know Reddit can be a cesspool, but recently people are creating posts there that Smithville was the only tornado that was an actual EF-5 that day, and that the other three, particularly HPC, should be downgraded. I would argue that it is more likely that there were MORE tornadoes that day that were capable of EF-5 damage at some point.

This is the funniest thing i’ve read all day lol.

There were literally at least 6-7 or even more tornadoes that were easily capable of causing EF5 damage ( or were robbed of such a rating ) or worth a reanalysis. Such as Tuscaloosa.

 

[mike36]

This is the funniest thing i’ve read all day lol.

There were literally at least 6-7 or even more tornadoes that were easily capable of causing EF5 damage ( or were robbed of such a rating ) or worth a reanalysis. Such as Tuscaloosa.

Also Flat Rock and Ringgold come to mind as one's that could have been upgraded also.

 

[speedbump305]

Also Flat Rock and Ringgold come to mind as one's that could have been upgraded also.

New Wren as well. MEG really needs to do a re analysis of that survey.

 

[TH2002]

Also Flat Rock and Ringgold come to mind as one's that could have been upgraded also.

To add on to my previous quip...
Hackleburg-Phil Campbell deserves its EF5 rating both contextually and structurally, even if only a few buildings genuinely met the EF5 criteria - namely a well anchored duplex in Phil Campbell, the Oak Grove mansion, and the restaurant in Mount Hope. The restaurant IMO is perhaps the most interesting; not only was it an extremely sturdy CMU-framed structure (which is already rare in the US outside of hurricane-prone regions) but a portion of the slab itself was buckled and sucked up. That takes an incredible amount of force and pushes it above "just your typical EF5". In addition, the homes near Tanner were well-built and anchored and could have probably qualified for EF5 imo.

I'm not sure about Flat Rock (admittedly don't know much about it) but a user on this forum managed to dig up proof that the slab home in Cherokee Valley, GA was indeed properly anchored, which should have put Ringgold squarely into the EF5 category.

Rainsville deserves its EF5 rating contextually, especially based on the fact that it pulled up sidewalk slabs and threw an anchored safe a considerable distance, ripping the door off in the process. A few slab homes were swept away as well, particularly on Blue Pond Blvd near Rainsville and another one in the Henagar area so it MIGHT meet the structural criteria for EF5 as well, but I'm not sure.

Regarding Philadelphia, I'm just gonna quote @buckeye05 here:

With all that said, I do agree that Philadelphia, MS was extremely violent and very likely an EF5. It’s just that trenching can’t be used as a “slam dunk” EF5 indicator like previously thought.

And yes, New Wren and Tuscaloosa were very likely EF5 as well, especially given the destruction of the railroad bridge over Hurricane Creek (Tuscaloosa) and the well-anchored homes, truck being carried over a mile, and other damage from New Wren.

So yeah... the claim that "Smithville was the only 2011 Super Outbreak tornado that deserved EF5" is an absolute truckload of stinky, nasty, fermenting piles of garbage.

 

[speedbump305]

To add on to my previous quip...
Hackleburg-Phil Campbell deserves its EF5 rating both contextually and structurally, even if only a few buildings genuinely met the EF5 criteria - namely a well anchored duplex in Phil Campbell, the Oak Grove mansion, and the restaurant in Mount Hope. The restaurant IMO is perhaps the most interesting; not only was it an extremely sturdy CMU-framed structure (which is already rare in the US outside of hurricane-prone regions) but a portion of the slab itself was buckled and sucked up. That takes an incredible amount of force and pushes it above "just your typical EF5". In addition, the homes near Tanner were well-built and anchored and could have probably qualified for EF5 imo.

I'm not sure about Flat Rock (admittedly don't know much about it) but a user on this forum managed to dig up proof that the slab home in Cherokee Valley, GA was indeed properly anchored, which should have put Ringgold squarely into the EF5 category.

Rainsville deserves its EF5 rating contextually, especially based on the fact that it pulled up sidewalk slabs and threw an anchored safe a considerable distance, ripping the door off in the process. A few slab homes were swept away as well, particularly on Blue Pond Blvd near Rainsville and another one in the Henagar area so it MIGHT meet the structural criteria for EF5 as well, but I'm not sure.

Regarding Philadelphia, I'm just gonna quote @buckeye05 here:


And yes, New Wren and Tuscaloosa were very likely EF5 as well, especially given the destruction of the railroad bridge over Hurricane Creek (Tuscaloosa) and the well-anchored homes, truck being carried over a mile, and other damage from New Wren.

So yeah... the claim that "Smithville was the only 2011 Super Outbreak tornado that deserved EF5" is an absolute truckload of stinky, nasty, fermenting piles of garbage.

To put it even more bluntly, it’s an absolute pile of s**t.

The fact that we’re likely at least 15-20 EF5’s that day never ceases to stun me.

 

[mike36]

To add on to my previous quip...
Hackleburg-Phil Campbell deserves its EF5 rating both contextually and structurally, even if only a few buildings genuinely met the EF5 criteria - namely a well anchored duplex in Phil Campbell, the Oak Grove mansion, and the restaurant in Mount Hope. The restaurant IMO is perhaps the most interesting; not only was it an extremely sturdy CMU-framed structure (which is already rare in the US outside of hurricane-prone regions) but a portion of the slab itself was buckled and sucked up. That takes an incredible amount of force and pushes it above "just your typical EF5". In addition, the homes near Tanner were well-built and anchored and could have probably qualified for EF5 imo.

I'm not sure about Flat Rock (admittedly don't know much about it) but a user on this forum managed to dig up proof that the slab home in Cherokee Valley, GA was indeed properly anchored, which should have put Ringgold squarely into the EF5 category.

Rainsville deserves its EF5 rating contextually, especially based on the fact that it pulled up sidewalk slabs and threw an anchored safe a considerable distance, ripping the door off in the process. A few slab homes were swept away as well, particularly on Blue Pond Blvd near Rainsville and another one in the Henagar area so it MIGHT meet the structural criteria for EF5 as well, but I'm not sure.

Regarding Philadelphia, I'm just gonna quote @buckeye05 here:


And yes, New Wren and Tuscaloosa were very likely EF5 as well, especially given the destruction of the railroad bridge over Hurricane Creek (Tuscaloosa) and the well-anchored homes, truck being carried over a mile, and other damage from New Wren.

So yeah... the claim that "Smithville was the only 2011 Super Outbreak tornado that deserved EF5" is an absolute truckload of stinky, nasty, fermenting piles of garbage.

Chris Darden, who was the MIC in Huntsville at the time, stated in an interview he felt the Flat Rock-Higdon tornado probably should have been rated EF-5 in hindsight. I'll try to find the clip.

 

[buckeye05]

Here’s what we’re seeing: It’s just trendy right now for impressionable young people in the weather community to play the “look how discerning and nit-picky I am” game because they think it adds a layer of legitimacy and validity to their takes on tornado intensity/ratings. People who were once naive “omg bare slabs, it was a EF5!!!” kids in YouTube comments sections are getting older, and are overcorrecting en mass as they try to distance themselves from prior naivety. So it’s just a lot of posturing, and young folks falling for the “dismissiveness = having a better grasp on tornado intensity and damage” fallacy, when the reality is a lot more nuanced than that. I went through both of those phases too, and I grew out of both as well. Took me a while to realize that best approach lies somewhere in the middle of those two extremes. Most will probably realize that too in time.

Anyway, best to just ignore stuff like that.

 

[buckeye05]

To put it even more bluntly, it’s an absolute pile of s**t.

The fact that we’re likely at least 15-20 EF5’s that day never ceases to stun me.

Well I don’t know about that, but there was at least a handful of others that either arguably deserved an EF5 rating (very confident about Tuscaloosa, fairly confident about New Wren, possibly when it comes to Ringgold, and I’m pretty iffy when it comes to Flat Rock), or at least were capable of producing EF5 damage but didn’t.

 

[joshoctober16]

To add on to my previous quip...
Hackleburg-Phil Campbell deserves its EF5 rating both contextually and structurally, even if only a few buildings genuinely met the EF5 criteria - namely a well anchored duplex in Phil Campbell, the Oak Grove mansion, and the restaurant in Mount Hope. The restaurant IMO is perhaps the most interesting; not only was it an extremely sturdy CMU-framed structure (which is already rare in the US outside of hurricane-prone regions) but a portion of the slab itself was buckled and sucked up. That takes an incredible amount of force and pushes it above "just your typical EF5". In addition, the homes near Tanner were well-built and anchored and could have probably qualified for EF5 imo.

I'm not sure about Flat Rock (admittedly don't know much about it) but a user on this forum managed to dig up proof that the slab home in Cherokee Valley, GA was indeed properly anchored, which should have put Ringgold squarely into the EF5 category.

Rainsville deserves its EF5 rating contextually, especially based on the fact that it pulled up sidewalk slabs and threw an anchored safe a considerable distance, ripping the door off in the process. A few slab homes were swept away as well, particularly on Blue Pond Blvd near Rainsville and another one in the Henagar area so it MIGHT meet the structural criteria for EF5 as well, but I'm not sure.

Regarding Philadelphia, I'm just gonna quote @buckeye05 here:


And yes, New Wren and Tuscaloosa were very likely EF5 as well, especially given the destruction of the railroad bridge over Hurricane Creek (Tuscaloosa) and the well-anchored homes, truck being carried over a mile, and other damage from New Wren.

So yeah... the claim that "Smithville was the only 2011 Super Outbreak tornado that deserved EF5" is an absolute truckload of stinky, nasty, fermenting piles of garbage.

apparently the whole hackleburg doesn't deserve EF5 rating talk comes from the fact that the famous oak groove mansion is not a well built brick home base on new info , apparently hearing all the anchor bolts were on the garage part and none on the main home.

there is already a lot of people on discord that say rainsville and philadelphia aren't EF5 , and also a uptick of them saying Smithville isn't the strongest tornado and also that the funeral home is over rated or something like that.

 

[Central Ohio Wx]

I know Reddit can be a cesspool, but recently people are creating posts there that Smithville was the only tornado that was an actual EF-5 that day, and that the other three, particularly HPC, should be downgraded. I would argue that it is more likely that there were MORE tornadoes that day that were capable of EF-5 damage at some point.

I think what they are saying is that structurally, out of every officially-rated EF5 tornado that day, Smithville is the only one that would’ve been rated EF5 today. And that’s not a completely insane take; both Philadelphia and Rainsville very likely would be rated in the 180-200 range today. Hackleburg’s a weird one as most of the structures it hit were horrendously-constructed, but I do think it would’ve been rated a 5 somewhere in Phil Campbell. The main portion of the Oak Grove mansion was indeed unanchored, and that would max out somewhere in the EF4 range.

Contextually, there are 6+ tornadoes that were into the EF5 range on 4/27.

 

[Grand Poo Bah]

Here’s what we’re seeing: It’s just trendy right now for impressionable young people in the weather community to play the “look how discerning and nit-picky I am” game because they think it adds a layer of legitimacy and validity to their takes on tornado intensity/ratings. People who were once naive “omg bare slabs, it was a EF5!!!” kids in YouTube comments sections are getting older, and are overcorrecting en mass as they try to distance themselves from prior naivety. So it’s just a lot of posturing, and young folks falling for the “dismissiveness = having a better grasp on tornado intensity and damage” fallacy, when the reality is a lot more nuanced than that. I went through both of those phases too, and I grew out of both as well. Took me a while to realize that best approach lies somewhere in the middle of those two extremes. Most will probably realize that too in time.

Anyway, best to just ignore stuff like that.

I doubt even you reached these levels of dismissive. You're giving them too much credit by comparing it to yourself haha. Some of these recent takes have been beyond absurd

 

[Grand Poo Bah]

I think what they are saying is that structurally, out of every officially-rated EF5 tornado that day, Smithville is the only one that would’ve been rated EF5 today. And that’s not a completely insane take; both Philadelphia and Rainsville very likely would be rated in the 180-200 range today. Hackleburg’s a weird one as most of the structures it hit were horrendously-constructed, but I do think it would’ve been rated a 5 somewhere in Phil Campbell. The main portion of the Oak Grove mansion was indeed unanchored, and that would max out somewhere in the EF4 range.

Contextually, there are 6+ tornadoes that were into the EF5 range on 4/27.

It absolutely is a completely insane take. How does finding one house with poorer construction than originally thought downgrade an entire tornado with several EF5 indicators? It's like these users don't feel important enough about their discoveries, so they have to change the whole tornado's classification to make them actually mean something.

The 2011 EF5s raised the bar so high it essentially made the rating impossible to achieve for 12 years. We're talking about some of the strongest tornadoes in history. Finding a few missing anchor bolts on a few houses does absolutely nothing to change that. You're taking tornadoes that easily had winds over 280 mph (a feat that is not that rare) and trying to justify a < 200mph rating. It's so off base it's crossing into absurdity.

This is what echo chambers do. A discord community has established a confirmation bias loop so strong it has abandoned all logic and reason.

 

[Central Ohio Wx]

It absolutely is a completely insane take. How does finding one house with poorer construction than originally thought downgrade an entire tornado with several EF5 indicators? It's like these users don't feel important enough about their discoveries, so they have to change the whole tornado's classification to make them actually mean something.

Re-read what I said - "out of every officially-rated EF5 tornado that day, Smithville is the only one that would’ve been rated EF5 today". With current rating practices, it's not out-of-the-question that two or three of the EF5s would be (wrongly) rated EF4. I'm not defending their position, just that I could see a world where 4/27 had only one or two EF5s. Philadelphia and Rainsville I have no doubt would be in the EF4 range today if they were to happen now (again, not that that's correct).

 

[Grand Poo Bah]

Re-read what I said - "out of every officially-rated EF5 tornado that day, Smithville is the only one that would’ve been rated EF5 today". With current rating practices, it's not out-of-the-question that two or three of the EF5s would be (wrongly) rated EF4.

See this is a valid thought experiment. And it's been covered in here multiple times, but the recent trend hasn't been about this line of thinking. There are several people legitimately making the argument those tornadoes didn't "deserve" their rating.

 

[ColdFront]

This then completely vanishes in the 80s, where most f5 ratings end up being much more verifiable and well supported. Then when La Plata gets demoted there is another split in the records which ends up essentially temporarily eliminating the f5 rating as a whole.

In truth, there hasn't ever really been a consistent precedent with either of the Fujita scale. The real problem is that a lot of people treat either one like they're the bible, even though again, neither have a consistent precedent.

Great post. Post 2013 as well. Seems like there are multiple, long periods where the scale inadvertently sets a very difficult threshold for 5s and correspondingly a drought follows. To me, the scales will always be flawed, and I just point back to my previous comment on something more “technologically superior” and applicable that would help exclude the subjectivity. Maybe not entirely, but most of it.

 

[Grand Poo Bah]

Re-read what I said - "out of every officially-rated EF5 tornado that day, Smithville is the only one that would’ve been rated EF5 today". With current rating practices, it's not out-of-the-question that two or three of the EF5s would be (wrongly) rated EF4. I'm not defending their position, just that I could see a world where 4/27 had only one or two EF5s. Philadelphia and Rainsville I have no doubt would be in the EF4 range today if they were to happen now (again, not that that's correct).

My opinion is the tornadoes on 04/27 are a big reason why EF5s are impossible to achieve today. Like I said, they were so intense they set the bar unreasonably high. So I think saying they wouldn't be rated the same today is circular logic, since they're the reason they wouldn't be rated so high.

 

[Lake Martin EF4]

6-7

2025 ended days ago my bro

To add on to my previous quip...
Hackleburg-Phil Campbell deserves its EF5 rating both contextually and structurally, even if only a few buildings genuinely met the EF5 criteria - namely a well anchored duplex in Phil Campbell, the Oak Grove mansion, and the restaurant in Mount Hope. The restaurant IMO is perhaps the most interesting; not only was it an extremely sturdy CMU-framed structure (which is already rare in the US outside of hurricane-prone regions) but a portion of the slab itself was buckled and sucked up. That takes an incredible amount of force and pushes it above "just your typical EF5". In addition, the homes near Tanner were well-built and anchored and could have probably qualified for EF5 imo.

I'm not sure about Flat Rock (admittedly don't know much about it) but a user on this forum managed to dig up proof that the slab home in Cherokee Valley, GA was indeed properly anchored, which should have put Ringgold squarely into the EF5 category.

Rainsville deserves its EF5 rating contextually, especially based on the fact that it pulled up sidewalk slabs and threw an anchored safe a considerable distance, ripping the door off in the process. A few slab homes were swept away as well, particularly on Blue Pond Blvd near Rainsville and another one in the Henagar area so it MIGHT meet the structural criteria for EF5 as well, but I'm not sure.

Regarding Philadelphia, I'm just gonna quote @buckeye05 here:


And yes, New Wren and Tuscaloosa were very likely EF5 as well, especially given the destruction of the railroad bridge over Hurricane Creek (Tuscaloosa) and the well-anchored homes, truck being carried over a mile, and other damage from New Wren.

So yeah... the claim that "Smithville was the only 2011 Super Outbreak tornado that deserved EF5" is an absolute truckload of stinky, nasty, fermenting piles of garbage.

Surprised you don't mention Cordova and Cullman here as well - you explicitly stated you considered Cordova an EF5 (well, unless that changed) and Cullman appeared to have some N A S T Y contextual damage (also, Barnesville).

 

[speedbump305]

2025 ended days ago my bro

That was not intentional I promise lol.

But anyway, I do remember one damage photo from the Cordova tornado that showed remarkable contextual damage. Grass was scoured and trees were debarked and shredded. I’m sure you know which one i’m talking about. I’ll need to find it.