Significant Tornado Events

[WIL9287]

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[buckeye05]

With all due respect, Bassfield is not ignored or underrated. It is quite possibly the most talked about tornado of 2020, and certainly of the Easter outbreak, which produced several other notable tornadoes. The surveyors actually talked the original builder and there were several flaws with the structure. High-end EF4 is the right call. Here’s a video about the QRT response to Bassfield and Ashby.

This video is awesome! Very informative. I always like to hear from Jim LaDue as well. He's a great surveyor and has very good intuition when it comes to damage. He always takes contextual damage into account too.

 

[Austin Dawg]

Based on aerial photo, it was likely that Ringgold strengthed significantly right before entering this place then it climb over the hill north of the subvision.
I am no botanist but I can tell trees in the sixth pic was the same species of Bassfield's debarking trees along Wille Fortenburry Road and was the second most insane debarking for this tree species I have notice in Dixie area.
Tree damages in this place was far severe than the average vehicle damages and the same thing happened on Tuscaloosa too. Horizontal winds proportion must stronger vertical winds proportion for both tornados. The core of both of them seems larger than Hackleburg/Smithville.
View attachment 6901

This looks exactly like the woods on north Smithville when it exited town. Exactly.

 

[Austin Dawg]

I’ve still yet to see a more impressive Hook echo, Debris ball, supercell structure, and radar couplet than tuscaloosa. The radar image of Tuscaloosa was literally the most impressive i’ve ever seen

Here's a view of Smithville you might not have seen. Go to the 8:40 mark.

 

[Robinson lee]

Definitely. It managed to keep that Hook for a super long time. If i had to guess, i think winds must be well above 210 mph to destroy a trestle. I’d say it takes a lot a force to do that as well

For me, I may not think that the extreme wind force much greater than 210 mph is needed to destroy the iron frame bridge, because we need to consider the problems in the construction, anchorage and Bridge connectivity of the iron frame bridge. In fact, shortly after the formation of the 2013 Moore tornado, similar iron frame bridges were also destroyed. It may take relatively strong wind to destroy the iron frame bridge, but at least I don't think it needs extremely extreme wind

 

[eric11]

Speaking of bridge damage,It is interesting to view the Greers Ferry Lake AR tornado in March 1984(I'm not clear it is the one that rated F4 on 3/15/1984).Looks like a metal bridge got completely torn off the concrete bridge pier and thrown, I'm not clear whether the bridge had some extent of anchoring.Also would like to know where did the"210mph"come from? Wasn't able to find out any paper about how strong the winds can take down a bridge.

 

[speedbump305]

With all due respect, Bassfield is not ignored or underrated. It is quite possibly the most talked about tornado of 2020, and certainly of the Easter outbreak, which produced several other notable tornadoes. The surveyors actually talked the original builder and there were several flaws with the structure. High-end EF4 is the right call. Here’s a video about the QRT response to Bassfield and Ashby.

You do have a point, the anchor bolt spacing was a bit too wide. At first i thought it had a lot, but when i looked at it more closely, i realize EF4 was the right call. To be honest i do think Bassfield did reach EF5 strength when it did that Insane Tree Debarking, But i think your right EF4 was the right call

 

[speedbump305]

For me, I may not think that the extreme wind force much greater than 210 mph is needed to destroy the iron frame bridge, because we need to consider the problems in the construction, anchorage and Bridge connectivity of the iron frame bridge. In fact, shortly after the formation of the 2013 Moore tornado, similar iron frame bridges were also destroyed. It may take relatively strong wind to destroy the iron frame bridge, but at least I don't think it needs extremely extreme wind

Yeah it genuinely depends on the construction. If it’s relatively weak, then it may not take a lot of wind to destroy it. But if it’s very well built, it may take quite a lot of force and wind to do that, i’d say winds would have to be in the EF5 range, but not above 210 mph. i Do agree with your opinion

 

[Marshal79344]

Speaking of bridge damage,It is interesting to view the Greers Ferry Lake AR tornado in March 1984(I'm not clear it is the one that rated F4 on 3/15/1984).Looks like a metal bridge got completely torn off the concrete bridge pier and thrown, I'm not clear whether the bridge had some extent of anchoring.Also would like to know where did the"210mph"come from? Wasn't able to find out any paper about how strong the winds can take down a bridge.
View attachment 6912
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That was one of the two rated F4, it was the second, longer-tracked one.

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

In terms of Bassfield, the high end rating of that cabin was quite reasonable due to the reason such as the anchor spacing being a little too big around the corner of the house. But reason like vehicle impact, was a little bit contradictory to me. We know when vehicle nearby house wasn't moved then it can be a reason why this house didn't rated EF4 or 5. But when the vehicle was tossed, it was just impossible to rule out the possibility that it had an impact on house damage, especially when the vehicle was tossed in very high speed. It was easy to understand beacuse no one can really figure out what actually happened to a certain damage. It can always be an potential vehicle impact to a house. So there was a contradiction exist to me.
The discussion about Bassfield was for sute widespread at that time and I think many people assume that it reached EF5 intensity some point of lifes. I think they were right. The DIs was so little along its path when at the peak intensity yet the damage it did to these limited DIs was truely remarkable. The true intensity of this tornado can still be underestimated even through the widespread discussion.

I believe they found paint on the house that matched with paint from the car that was thrown into the field.

 

[pohnpei]

I believe they found paint on the house that matched with paint from the car that was thrown into the field.

Yeah, I noticed this in aerial video. If the house and the vehicle was failed at same time which was more likely due to the very fast speed of the tornado, there still can be a paint left on the vehicle.
If the vehicle did penetrate the whole house then fly additional 300 yards, then this vehicle damage can be even more impressive because it needs very large acceleration of the speed to do that. If winds here was not strong enough, the vehicle would stuck inside the destroyed house rather than flying additional 900 feet.
Also, vehicle alone had no capablility to invalid the anchor bolt system, let alone bent most of the anchor bolts which showed in some damage videos. What vehicle can damage was the wall and roof of the building which can be easy to suggest that it would be damaged even when there was no vehicle here.
So I didn't deny the possibility of the potential vehicle impact, what I confused was how vehicle impact can just invalidate a fairly well anchored house.

 

[Equus]

Old truss bridges generally rest on bearings below the end post, which isn't especially difficult to dislodge with the strong lateral forces of tornadoes, but that isn't universally the case. Greers Ferry looks like it may have been a continuous or cantilever truss which is a good bit more impressive; can't believe I hadn't seen that before.



An old circa 1900 Pratt truss on Johnsey Bridge Road near here considered in poor condition survived the 11/10/02 Saragossa F3. The one below however was tossed by an F3 in Iowa in 2004.

 

[speedbump305]

Ok y’all, I want to solve this Hackleburg image. I’ve always been curious if this was a poured concrete foundation or a block foundation. I’ve looked for cinder blocks and i have not found any yet. Do any of y’all know what foundation type this is? if this is poured concrete, i swear i’m gonna go crazy. But i have a feeling it was a frame home foundation

 

[atrainguy]

Not exactly a historic or exceptionally powerful tornado, but today is the 9th anniversary of the Dexter EF3, which IIRC is the last tornado stronger than F2/EF2 here in Michigan. Thankfully no casualties, although it did demolish a couple homes.

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

Possible scouring on satellite imagery from the 1st Canyon TX tornado. (just east of I-27 N) This is around where the tornado peaked on radar.

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

Possible scouring from the 2nd tornado.

 

[speedbump305]

Possible scouring from the 2nd tornado.View attachment 6934View attachment 6933

Your right. Plausible ground scouring noticeable.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Here's a very underrated tornado imo that doesn't get talked about often. The Columbia, MS EF3 of 12-23-2014 leveled multiple brick homes in the town. At least one of them (first one) was well anchored to its foundation with closely-spaced bolts, and was even partially swept clean. This damage was rated 165 MPH EF3. At that stage, why not just go with EF4? They would have been well within their rights to do so.

Wondering if this may be another case of a tornado being intentionally underrated like Vilonia. Just speculation on my part.

 

[buckeye05]

Wondering if this may be another case of a tornado being intentionally underrated like Vilonia. Just speculation on my part.

IDK, it’s JAN and I feel like they were always pretty fair and middle of the road with their ratings, but right after Vilonia from earlier in 2014, they got real conservative for a while.

Eventually, they went back to their more objective, context-heavy method of surveying, but I think the precedent set by Vilonia rattled several survey teams at various WFOs, causing them to second guess their ratings and play it more conservative than they normally would.

This, in my opinion, was the worst part of the Vilonia rating debacle. It set an absolutely terrible precedent and temporarily plunged us back into post-La Plata F-scale territory. I wouldn’t be surprised if some WFOs are still kinda “shaking it off” so to speak.

One big positive is I’m seeing a little bit of an increase in tree damage-based EF4s. Most surveyors weren’t quite bold enough to make those kind of calls a few years back, but it’s more become accepted that debarking of a certain intensity is unique to EF4+ events.

 

[speedbump305]

IDK, it’s JAN and I feel like they were always pretty fair and middle of the road with their ratings, but right after Vilonia from earlier in 2014, they got real conservative for a while.

Eventually, they went back to their more objective, context-heavy method of surveying, but I think the precedent set by Vilonia rattled several survey teams at various WFOs, causing them to second guess their ratings and play it more conservative than they normally would.

This, in my opinion, was the worst part of the Vilonia rating debacle. It set an absolutely terrible precedent and temporarily plunged us back into post-La Plata F-scale territory. I wouldn’t be surprised if some WFOs are still kinda “shaking it off” so to speak.

One big positive is I’m seeing a little bit of an increase in tree damage-based EF4s. Most surveyors weren’t quite bold enough to make those kind of calls a few years back, but it’s more become accepted that debarking of a certain intensity is unique to EF4+ events.

Honestly there are two periods of F-EF Scale mess ups. La Plata and Vilonia controversy. Literally ever since Vilonia, we have had several EF4s and even a few EF3s that have produced EF5 damage and the EF3s were producing EF4-EF5 damage. Vilonia,Rochelle,Chapman, Chickasha, and goldsby were all seriously underrated. Rochelle was literally able to pull a concrete walkway a few inches from it’s starting point thats just insane damage. The Canton Texas EF3 is also a good example, based on what i’ve seen, it was definitely an EF4. Completely missed houses and damage indicators. La plata was just so annoying. We had so many underrated tornadoes after that. Westminster and Harper. I just really hope this can stop soon and ratings can be more accurate