Severe Weather 2025

[buckeye05]

Second-hand embarrassment from that tweet aside, from what I’ve heard, the house obliterated by the Gary tornado was built in 1918. Many farm homes from this era are largely unanchored, essentially resting on their foundations via gravity alone. I’ll reserve judgement until I get a good look at the foundation to confirm this, but the survey team’s hands would essentially be tied if this is the case, even if there’s a bunch of scouring and debarking.

Yes the current application of the scale is flawed, but I’m getting concerned that we’re sliding back a bit to the ages of freaking out any time an empty foundation or scouring doesn’t result in an an automatic violent rating. It doesn’t work that way, even when approaching it from a reasonable mindset.

 

[buckeye05]

Yeah, taking a closer look and y’all are COMPLETELY overreacting here. First off it’s confirmed to be an old house from the early 1900s, and secondly look at the debris pattern. The structure components are thrown into a heap downwind from the foundation with minimal debris scatter. That is a dead giveaway for a slider. No scouring on the property either, and shrubs look to have held up ok. Tree damage could be much worse too. I honestly feel like I’m reading the comments under a poorly informed twitter post in here, rather than the type of discussion I normally expect here, barring some exceptions. I’d likely rate this EF3 too if it were up to me. Seriously, you guys should know better.

 

[tornado examiner]

Yeah, y’all are COMPLETELY overreacting here. First off it’s confirmed to be an old house from the early 1900s, and secondly look at the debris pattern. The structure components are thrown into a heap downwind from the foundation with minimal debris scatter. That is a dead giveaway for a slider. Tree damage could be worse too. I honestly feel like I’m reading the comments under a poorly informed twitter post in here, rather than the type of discussion I normally expect here, barring some exceptions. I’d likely rate this EF3 too if it were up to me. Seriously, get it together…
View attachment 44697

Minor correction the home was destroyed by the northern side of the tornado, “up wind”. Core tracked just to the south of the foundation and Likely slid the house backwards opposite the direction of the tornado’s forward vector. And the home still did explode quite a bit. Would like to know what the subfloor was like before I make any final conclusions.

 

[buckeye05]

If that’s rated EF3, then we got a serious issue. That was NOT an EF3.

Gotta love that what used to be the barrier between F4 and F5 is now the barrier between EF3 and EF4. No reasonable person believes 150 mph winds can dissapear a house, regardless of how well it's built. There's no data, math, or studies to support those estimates either. It's literally just a habit at this point. You can really tell a difference between people who first became interested in tornadoes in 2011 versus the people who have followed them since the 90s or earlier. The former just thinks surveying has always been done this way, while most people in the latter see how far we've trended backwards.

This is just simply asinine. It’s by all indications a slider house from the early 1900s. These types of homes have received F3 ratings dating all the way back to the pre-2000s “old school” F-scale era, and it’s absurd to claim that mid-range (F3/EF3) tornadoes can’t sweep away or level unanchored homes. I mean come on, Fujita himself rated leveled or swept away homes F3 sometimes (Decatur IL, Rainsville, IN, and others). Plus, I’ve seen wind tests done where industrial strength wind-makers for movie production were pointed at cheap nailed-down tract homes inside airplane hangars, and leveled them with mid-100s wind speeds, which irrefutably proves this can and DOES happen to frail/older homes. You’re literally just blowing hot air (no pun intended) because you see an empty foundation, which is straight up YouTube comments section depth of analysis, and are citing a “good ol’ days” hyper-liberal rating application style that never really existed to begin with, even when Dr. Fujita himself was alive.

The bottom line is, he rated sliders F3 on multiple occasions, and this was by all indications, a slider. That’s all there is to it, period, done, over and out, put to bed, mic drop, whatever you want to call it. Sheesh…

 

[TH2002]

@buckeye05

Glad someone else said exactly what I was thinking lol. Moment I saw that aerial photo, I thought "hmmm, maybe EF3 isn't such a bad call after all."

"But tornadoes like New Richmond destroyed similarly constructed homes with no anchor bolts!!" Yeah, but New Richmond also caused extreme contextual damage, Gary did not.

We shall now see if this thread further devolves into a sh!tstorm of twitter level discourse about how bad the NWS and EF scale are.

 

[Ozonelayer]

@buckeye05

Glad someone else said exactly what I was thinking lol. Moment I saw that aerial photo, I thought "hmmm, maybe EF3 isn't such a bad call after all."

"But tornadoes like New Richmond destroyed similarly constructed homes with no anchor bolts!!" Yeah, but New Richmond also caused extreme contextual damage, Gary did not.

We shall now see if this thread further devolves into a sh!tstorm of twitter level discourse about how bad the NWS and EF scale are.

Yeah, upon re-evaluating the imagery, I decided that maybe EF-4 isn't the right call. EF-3 150 MPH to 160 MPH is what I would put it as. I still 100% think it reached EF-4 at some point given the scouring, but the home was, as mentioned, a slider. Not well built enough for an EF-4.

 

[buckeye05]

@buckeye05

Glad someone else said exactly what I was thinking lol. Moment I saw that aerial photo, I thought "hmmm, maybe EF3 isn't such a bad call after all."

"But tornadoes like New Richmond destroyed similarly constructed homes with no anchor bolts!!" Yeah, but New Richmond also caused extreme contextual damage, Gary did not.

We shall now see if this thread further devolves into a sh!tstorm of twitter level discourse about how bad the NWS and EF scale are.

Thank you. I genuinely thought we were collectively well past the “immediately freak out at every empty foundation that isn’t rated EF4 or higher” era here. I will say there is a LOT of social media hype surrounding this particular tornado. As soon as the videos of the drill-bit and associated scouring hit the web, it was just a tidal wave of “OMG VIOLENT TORNADO, this BETTER BE RATED EF4” all over social media. Tons of hype before any damage photos were released, and I think many people got entangled in group-think very quickly, even on this forum.

The bottom line is the only thing you should be looking at is the damage photos, and looking at them as objectively and calmly as possible. Not crazy chaser videos, not melodramatic social media posts about scouring and slabbed homes and “violent” damage despite no clear photos to back it up, JUST the damage pics and the available survey info.

I’d bet 100 bucks that if this was some poorly documented nighttime tornado that no chasers were on, nobody would be freaking out over the rating. In this case, hype took hold before the photos were even released, and once they were, it was just a one way ticket to confirmation bias city. Just a total lack of objectivity from the get go with this specific tornado.

 

[N0mz]

Thank you. I genuinely thought we were collectively well past the “immediately freak out at every empty foundation that isn’t rated EF4 or higher” era here. I will say there is a LOT of social media hype surrounding this particular tornado. As soon as the videos of the drill-bit and associated scouring hit the web, it was just a tidal wave of “OMG VIOLENT TORNADO, this BETTER BE RATED EF4” all over social media. Tons of hype before any damage photos were released, and I think many people got entangled in group-think very quickly, even on this forum.

The bottom line is the only thing you should be looking at is the damage photos, and looking at them as objectively and calmly as possible. Not crazy chaser videos, not s melodramatic social media posts about scouring and slabbed homes and “violent” damage despite no clear photos to back it up, JUST the damage pics and the available survey info.

I’d bet 100 bucks that if this was some poorly documented nighttime tornado that no chasers were on, nobody would be freaking out over the rating. In this case, hype took hold before the photos were even released, and once they were, it was just a one way ticket to confirmation bias city. Just a total lack of objectivity from the get go with this specific tornado.

I think Will/TornadoTRX has to take a lot of blame for overhyping this one. He claimed the night of that the house got slabbed and swept clean with zero pictures. Very strong and certain wording. Obviously with the drone shots we’ve seen, the home was another Central/North planes shitbox and the “swept clean” foundation was very obviously a garage.

 

[buckeye05]

I think Will/TornadoTRX has to take a lot of blame for overhyping this one. He claimed the night of that the house got slabbed and swept clean with zero pictures. Very strong and certain wording. Obviously with the drone shots we’ve seen, the home was another Central/North planes shitbox and the “swept clean” foundation was very obviously a garage.

This is why we HAVE to wait for the pictures to be released and not let social media WX personalities dictate the narrative. The problem is, once the pics were released, people were already amped up and expecting violent damage, so any chance at impartiality was already out the window for many. Once one person says “oh this rating is BS!”, it just turns into an emotion filled domino effect of affirming replies with no real depth of thought, leading to crazy logic such as the claim that it should be EF4 simply because the house is gone. Yet we all know (or at least should know) that’s not how it works, nor is it a reasonable assessment.

 

[Equus]

Catching up after life's twists and turns, been watching the active upper plains June from the sidelines. Absolutely floored by the videos from yesterday, an absolute fluid dynamics feast out there on high def video. What an incredible tornado, glad that happened before sunset so all that insanity was visible.

Trees are only occasionally present in those vast South Dakota farm fields, around houses and along rivers, so I'd bet that at its strongest point there were no trees to provide contextuals; still probably a better indicator at the farmstead than a century old slider house or the nearby sheds. Definitely violent potential in some of those structural shifts but nothing to hit at those points but power poles, looks like

Being used to fast moving wedges in the south, it's always interesting to see a long lived intense tornado be a slow moving drill bit and garner a path length of under 7 miles and only 100 yards wide lol

 

[N0mz]

Catching up after life's twists and turns, been watching the active upper plains June from the sidelines. Absolutely floored by the videos from yesterday, an absolute fluid dynamics feast out there on high def video. What an incredible tornado, glad that happened before sunset so all that insanity was visible.

Trees are only occasionally present in those vast South Dakota farm fields, around houses and along rivers, so I'd bet that at its strongest point there were no trees to provide contextuals; still probably a better indicator at the farmstead than a century old slider house or the nearby sheds. Definitely violent potential in some of those structural shifts but nothing to hit at those points but power poles, looks like

Just barely dodged what could have been some better built houses by literal yards but I wouldn’t have held my breath on those either.

 

[Equus]

I've always wondered if those who live on those farmsteads that come so close to the tornado and get clipped would want copies of chaser videos to show off to everyone what they just missed, or if they'd really rather not think about it again

 

[N0mz]

I've always wondered if those who live on those farmsteads that come so close to the tornado and get clipped would want copies of chaser videos to show off to everyone what they just missed, or if they'd really rather not think about it again

Depends on the person… Personally I would be super hyped to see that go by my house, assuming no damage, but I could see some pipes I know personally would want to not think about it

 

[buckeye05]

Also can anyone show me any photos of this supposed “crazy scouring” this thing produced? Again, tons of social media hype, yet all I’m seeing is the standard spiral markings/crop damage any strong tornado will leave behind when moving through a farm field. There’s really not that much removal of actual vegetation here.


Honestly, it’s arguably not as impressive as the crop scouring produced by the EF2 that hit the Dominator. In general, it doesn’t take a violent tornado to scour crops quite badly. Proof:

 

[jiharris0220]

Just gonna leave this twitter thread here for y’all to read and say, I sincerely hope this forum never actually comes to this point.

 

[buckeye05]

Just gonna leave this twitter thread here for y’all to read and say, I sincerely hope this forum never actually comes to this point.

N0mz is right. Will is pushing the “violent” narrative hard, and essentially basing it on an argument that consists of “I was there and it was like, totally crazy and stuff”. Ridiculous, yet people eat this stuff up. I hate 90% of WX influencers. There’s also the issue of amped up chasers making rating calls on social media when they probably couldn’t even tell you what a sill plate or CMU is if you asked them.

I WANT there to be well informed debate and pushback against unreasonable and flawed ratings of tornadoes, but it gets drowned out by a sea of passionately ignorant people doing more harm than good. Anyone who actually has good points to make and knows their stuff are unfortunately subject to guilt by association. Everything that has happened with the Gary tornado unfortunately only reinforces a likely pre-existing perception of “screeching, obnoxious, poorly-informed general public” from the perspective of the NWS. In this specific case, that’d be a fair assessment.

 

[N0mz]

N0mz is right. Will is pushing the “violent” narrative hard, and essentially basing it on an argument that consists of “I was there and it was like, totally crazy and stuff”. Ridiculous, yet people eat this stuff up. I hate 90% of WX influencers. There’s also the issue of amped up chasers making rating calls on social media when they probably couldn’t even tell you what a sill plate or CMU is if you asked them.

I WANT there to be well informed debate and pushback against unreasonable and flawed ratings of tornadoes, but it gets drowned out by a sea of passionately ignorant people doing more harm than good. Anyone who actually has good points to make and knows their stuff are unfortunately subject to guilt by association. Everything that has happened with the Gary tornado unfortunately only reinforces a likely pre-existing perception of “screeching, obnoxious, poorly-informed general public” from the perspective of the NWS.

Nick did himself no favors being passive aggressive in this tweet either. I would much rather he had stood his ground and actually came out and said what he was thinking instead of that BS “it’s always interesting how…”

As an almost completely online community we struggle as a whole with communication (see: overhyping) and when people are too scared/too smug to actually say their point it really hurts the discussion.

 

[N0mz]

Also can anyone show me any photos of this supposed “crazy scouring” this thing produced? Again, tons of social media hype, yet all I’m seeing is the standard spiral markings/crop damage any strong tornado will leave behind when moving through a farm field. There’s really not that much removal of actual vegetation here.
View attachment 44698

Honestly, it’s arguably not as impressive as the crop scouring produced by the EF2 that hit the Dominator. In general, it doesn’t take a violent tornado to scour crops quite badly. Proof:
View attachment 44699View attachment 44700

Also people were talking about “oh it looks so similar to Elie!” Please just look at the famous Elie video; the motion in the Elie video more than 20m off the ground (obscured by the building in foreground) is more impressive than the zoomed in, 2m AGL, HD video we saw from Gary. Just wanted to vent about how this thing got overhyped just because of chaser convergence.

 

[AJS]

Also man, this is just unproductive, stupid, and frankly quite immature

I’m not tryna stir up any debates or controversial discussions, but tweets like this make me understand why Nick Kras had a lot of negative things to say about this forum.

 

[OH-IOan]

What about this? Nobody's talked about the tornado throwing "cars and large farm vehicles" 300 yards.