Significant Tornado Events

[Casuarina Head]

In his book Warnings: the True Story of How Science Tamed the Weather, Mike Smith considered the Ruskin Heights MO tornado to have produced more intense DIs than either the Greensburg KS or Joplin MO tornadoes. As far as I know the Ruskin Heights tornado did not snap poured concrete basement walls, unlike Joplin, Parkersburg IA, or Brandenburg KY, nor did it destroy solid brick structures (i.e., schools or churches) with interior walls, whereas Udall KS, Greensburg, and Mayfield KY did so. Photographs of the damage in Ruskin Heights show that subfloors and/or tiles remained on several of the foundations. In Significant Tornadoes Thomas P. Grazulis did mention that pilots reported tornado-related debris at up to 30,000 ft in altitude, which may have some bearing on intensity. Does anyone have photographs showing high-end DIs in Ruskin Heights?

 

[pohnpei]

In his book Warnings: the True Story of How Science Tamed the Weather, Mike Smith considered the Ruskin Heights MO tornado to have produced more intense DIs than either the Greensburg KS or Joplin MO tornadoes. As far as I know the Ruskin Heights tornado did not snap poured concrete basement walls, unlike Joplin, Parkersburg IA, or Brandenburg KY, nor did it destroy solid brick structures (i.e., schools or churches) with interior walls, whereas Udall KS, Greensburg, and Mayfield KY did so. Photographs of the damage in Ruskin Heights show that subfloors and/or tiles remained on several of the foundations. In Significant Tornadoes Thomas P. Grazulis did mention that pilots reported tornado-related debris at up to 30,000 ft in altitude, which may have some bearing on intensity. Does anyone have photographs showing high-end DIs in Ruskin Heights?

He also said Greensburg/Trousdale was the strongest of all time on Twitter.

 

[andyhb]

Mike Smith is an idiot so...

 

[CheeselandSkies]

Mike Smith is an idiot so...

Tell us how you really feel, Andy! LOL!

If it's the same Mike Smith I'm thinking of, he certainly likes to take every opportunity to plug his book over on Stormtrack. I will say he makes some decent points in his posts but also some that I vehemently disagree with.

 

[tornado examiner]

lmao no. greensburg was barely worthy of an ef5 rating. its like, literally just over the edge for ef5 damage. everything else is ef4 to ef3 damage. the velocities where high on radar yeah but there's been tornadoes that blow greensburg out of the water with their velocities.
greensburg has absolutely no chance of being rated ef5 today.

 

[tornado examiner]

i feel that fast moving thin cored tornadoes doing high end damage are more often stronger than large slow moving wedges. traditional tornado alley tornadoes can be incredibly violent sure. this isnt disputed. but compared to the worst deep south tornadoes they are regularly surpassed in a multitude of ways.

plus i find it funny that a core inside a wedge can completely sweep away a well anchored home in around 3 to 5 seconds. can you imagine what that would look like if there was no tornado visible and just the wind field/ thermodynamics? ive always wanted to be able to visualise the process of how that happens without the visual imparements from condensation.

my best two guess's is that the house is ripped cleanly off its foundation in mostly one piece by the verticle shear.
or is hit so hard by the wind exceleration that its sheared off sideways before being sucked back into the vortex as it passes over.
cause homes hit by those tornadoes are most likely not going section by section.
its to fast for that and the winds required must be in excess of 280 mph within the core.

im referring to the april 27 2011 ef5's yes.

 

[Casuarina Head]

He also said Greensburg/Trousdale was the strongest of all time on Twitter.

It is quite revealing that all the events on his list, save the Tri-State, occurred on the Great Plains. Any list that does not include Vilonia AR, Smithville MS, Philadelphia MS, Hackleburg AL, Guin AL, Andover KS, Udall KS, Beecher MI, Jarrell TX, Stratton NE, Bakersfield Valley TX, Parkersburg IA, Brandenburg KY, Joplin MO, Mayfield KY, Niles OH/Wheatland PA, and probably Topeka KS, in addition to several other notable events, is necessarily incomplete and thus deficient. Arguably Udall and Mayfield were at least as strong as the Greensburg event, if not stronger, given similar damage to sturdy brick structures. Also, I don’t know why Moore ’13 is so far behind Bridge Creek on his list.

 

[tornado examiner]

man ef-scale tornadoes on the high end are so watered down...

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

In his book Warnings: the True Story of How Science Tamed the Weather, Mike Smith considered the Ruskin Heights MO tornado to have produced more intense DIs than either the Greensburg KS or Joplin MO tornadoes. As far as I know the Ruskin Heights tornado did not snap poured concrete basement walls, unlike Joplin, Parkersburg IA, or Brandenburg KY, nor did it destroy solid brick structures (i.e., schools or churches) with interior walls, whereas Udall KS, Greensburg, and Mayfield KY did so. Photographs of the damage in Ruskin Heights show that subfloors and/or tiles remained on several of the foundations. In Significant Tornadoes Thomas P. Grazulis did mention that pilots reported tornado-related debris at up to 30,000 ft in altitude, which may have some bearing on intensity. Does anyone have photographs showing high-end DIs in Ruskin Heights?

Ruskin Heights did sweep away an anchor-bolted home but it didn't really produce any extremely impressive damage.

 

[TH2002]

lmao no. greensburg was barely worthy of an ef5 rating. its like, literally just over the edge for ef5 damage. everything else is ef4 to ef3 damage. the velocities where high on radar yeah but there's been tornadoes that blow greensburg out of the water with their velocities.
greensburg has absolutely no chance of being rated ef5 today.

There are some more recently surfaced photos that show Greensburg was a higher end EF5 than I initally thought:







However I do 100% agree that Greensburg (unfortunately, like most of the official EF5's) would not receive that rating today.

 

[buckeye05]

Ruskin Heights did sweep away an anchor-bolted home but it didn't really produce any extremely impressive damage.

It wasn’t just one home. All the homes in Ruskin Heights were anchor bolted, and aerial photos show multiple homes left in the same state as the one above.

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

It wasn’t just one home. All the homes in Ruskin Heights were anchor bolted, and aerial photos show multiple homes left in the same state as the one above.

Are there other photos showing anchor-bolted homes that were slabbed in Ruskin Heights?

 

[TH2002]

It wasn’t just one home. All the homes in Ruskin Heights were anchor bolted, and aerial photos show multiple homes left in the same state as the one above.

Is it just that most of them were ripped from their subflooring instead?

 

[tornado examiner]

There are some more recently surfaced photos that show Greensburg was a higher end EF5 than I initally thought:
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However I do 100% agree that Greensburg (unfortunately, like most of the official EF5's) would not receive that rating today.

in that first photo near the bottom right you see homes swept away. a few of these were rated ef5....yet...notice how the trees near them...STILL HAVE THERE LEAVES???? how the heck does that work!!????

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

There are some more recently surfaced photos that show Greensburg was a higher end EF5 than I initally thought:
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However I do 100% agree that Greensburg (unfortunately, like most of the official EF5's) would not receive that rating today.

Two other photos from Greensburg demonstrating this thing was more violent than many people seem to think:

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Also check out this photo from Greensburg, looks like a car that was rolled up into a ball and mangled beyond recognition (would like to get a confirmation or clearer photo at some point):

 

[tornado examiner]

Two other photos from Greensburg demonstrating this thing was more violent than many people seem to think:

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the tornado was very slow moving with a multi vortex structure like joplin. it sat over greensburg for multiple minutes. if the whole thing was violent then there wouldnt have been a single structure left standing in town. its definitely the work of a weak wedge with strong sub vorticies. or maybe not who knows. trying to explain wedge tornado damage as opposed to small tornado damage is much more difficult...

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

The most impressive contextual damage and ground views of structural damage I could find from the 1957 Ruskin Heights tornado.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

The most impressive contextual damage and ground views of structural damage I could find from the 1957 Ruskin Heights tornado.

There used to be a thread dedicated to it, apparently:

'Ruskin Heights' tornado (1957)

- 44 killed (500+ injured) - 71 mile track - Debris spotted at 30,000 feet by pilots flying near the storm - Mail from Grandview, MO was found in Iowa (165 miles away) http://www.flatlandkc.org/news-issues/cover-story/60th-anniversary-ruskin-heights-tornado-kansas-city-missouri/...

talkweather.com

Grazulis gives Ruskin Heights an F4 rating, but I don't see why it shouldn't be rated F5, I've never seen these automobile damage pics from it before, really impressive.

 

[buckeye05]

Is it just that most of them were ripped from their subflooring instead?

Exactly. The Ruskin Heights neighborhood was built all at once, and all the houses were built the same. Any home that lost its subfloor there sustained the same type of damage as the photo you posted, and there were several. But yes, most were swept from their subfloors.