Significant Tornado Events

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Been reading through the booklet F5-F6 tornadoes by Grazulis and came across a couple intriguing things that I wanted to discuss one.

One, this tidbit about Winfield, KS of 1991:



The bit about the home being so obliterated that it was missed by surveyors is something I've always seen associated with Kellerville, looks like this is the tornado that this actually originated with.

This bit:



I hope Grazulis isn't one of those who thinks that Jarrell was an F3 or that this logic was used by certain people to make the claim Jarrell was simply an F3 that was able to do what it did simply by being stationary for several minutes.

This is a tornado I'd love to find more info about:



I think this is the earliest tornado that Grazulis considers can be verified as F5 with the available evidence, but not entirely sure. He gives the Natchez, MS tornado and the Camanche, IA tornado F4 ratings.

Also, the Waverly, LA/Inverness MS tornado of the 1971 Delta Outbreak is given an F5 rating in this book, whereas in Significant Tornadoes he has it ranked F4. Not sure if typo or not, but interesting to notice.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

I don't remember much about this event off-hand tbh, but I've got a handful of random photos:

I swear I saw some of these on an old website since lost to time, so glad you managed to have some at your disposal!
Also, do you have any photos of damage from the 1971 Waverly, LA tornado of the Delta outbreak that later went on to damage several communities in Mississippi. I've found plenty of photographs of the damage in Delta City, Inverness, Pugh City and the other areas devastated on the Mississippi side but nothing from the Louisiana side where the F5 damage was reported.

 

[eric11]

There was an eyewitness who was describing the Brandenburg damage in more rural areas southwest of town, and he said that the tornado “left no grass” in areas near Kentucky Highway 79.

Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find photos of this exact spot. I do believe that the house which had its poured concrete basement wall blown in was along that general segment of the path though, which further suggests extreme intensity.

Brandenburg might have produced some of the worst damage ever documented in KY before Mayfield, and the severity of damage could be on par with what Mayfield EF4 did in Bremen arguably.

This is the extreme ground scouring you may want to look for, it removed the top soil when coming dowing from the hills and wiped nearly everything visible in its path.




Here' s the before-after photo of Brandenburg, you can see the extreme centerline just like those top-tier EF5 like Vilonia and Smithville.

Completely dismembered car parts

 

[eric11]

Brandenburg also be a strong candidate when it comes to large building or facilities damage.
here's what it looks like before and after the F5

Large buildings in town were almost completely demolished like what we saw in downtown Mayfield.

 

[eric11]

Been reading through the booklet F5-F6 tornadoes by Grazulis and came across a couple intriguing things that I wanted to discuss one.

One, this tidbit about Winfield, KS of 1991:

View attachment 13602

The bit about the home being so obliterated that it was missed by surveyors is something I've always seen associated with Kellerville, looks like this is the tornado that this actually originated with.

This bit:

View attachment 13603

I hope Grazulis isn't one of those who thinks that Jarrell was an F3 or that this logic was used by certain people to make the claim Jarrell was simply an F3 that was able to do what it did simply by being stationary for several minutes.

This is a tornado I'd love to find more info about:

View attachment 13604

I think this is the earliest tornado that Grazulis considers can be verified as F5 with the available evidence, but not entirely sure. He gives the Natchez, MS tornado and the Camanche, IA tornado F4 ratings.

Also, the Waverly, LA/Inverness MS tornado of the 1971 Delta Outbreak is given an F5 rating in this book, whereas in Significant Tornadoes he has it ranked F4. Not sure if typo or not, but interesting to notice.

As far as I know, the Kellerville F5 "missing house" rumor was claimed once ago by someone on Stormtrack, but I could not find the source.

 

[eric11]

Damage from Moore 2013 at the Orr Family Farm. Intense ground scouring occurred in the field south of the main farm and large steel tanks were thrown up to a half-mile.

View attachment 13576

I've mentioned in this thread before that some horses in Orr Family Farm suffered brutal, Jarrell-extent wounds with heads being cut off and skin got peeled off.

The damage around Orr Family Farm and Celestial Acres was exactly Jarrell-like or much more worse, that the whole place was ruined as if it was thrown into a blender and mixed everything together.

 

[CheeselandSkies]

Yikes, those photos from Moore '13 show perhaps the most extreme vehicle mangling since...Moore '99 (which I consider the poster child for F5 vehicle damage, namely that photo of the pickup stripped to the frame and wrapped around a power pole).

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Brandenburg also be a strong candidate when it comes to large building or facilities damage.
here's what it looks like before and after the F5
View attachment 13615
Large buildings in town were almost completely demolished like what we saw in downtown Mayfield.
View attachment 13616View attachment 13617View attachment 13618

Another thing about Brandenburg is how visible its narrow core is when it went through the town, not often you see that except with so much of the high-end Dixie events.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Yikes, those photos from Moore '13 show perhaps the most extreme vehicle mangling since...Moore '99 (which I consider the poster child for F5 vehicle damage, namely that photo of the pickup stripped to the frame and wrapped around a power pole).

It occurred after Moore '13, but Chapman is probably the most extreme vehicle mangling I've seen since Moore 1999.

 

[Equus]

So... I think many of us remember the remarkable intense tornadoes surrounding GWX radar on the night of 4/13/19? The Hamilton, MS high end EF2 being the highest officially rated of the tornado family due to the extremely rural area of impact. A study is forthcoming suggesting the latter tornado, starting a few hundred yards E of GWX radar and officially rated either EF1 or low EF2, may have been an EF4+ tornado based on an extreme tree damage swath in an area the ground survey team didn't reach, and aligning with extreme low level velocities from the insanely low level scan from GWX. An interesting prelude to the need for upcoming tree damage DI revisions perhaps?

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Brandenburg might have produced some of the worst damage ever documented in KY before Mayfield, and the severity of damage could be on par with what Mayfield EF4 did in Bremen arguably.
View attachment 13605View attachment 13606
This is the extreme ground scouring you may want to look for, it removed the top soil when coming dowing from the hills and wiped nearly everything visible in its path.
View attachment 13607
View attachment 13608
View attachment 13609
View attachment 13610
Here' s the before-after photo of Brandenburg, you can see the extreme centerline just like those top-tier EF5 like Vilonia and Smithville.
View attachment 13611View attachment 13612
Completely dismembered car parts
View attachment 13613

Here's a video with color footage of some of the black and white pics you have....looks like quite a bit of the hill was indeed scoured of grass but not all of it:

 

[andyhb]

So... I think many of us remember the remarkable intense tornadoes surrounding GWX radar on the night of 4/13/19? The Hamilton, MS high end EF2 being the highest officially rated of the tornado family due to the extremely rural area of impact. A study is forthcoming suggesting the latter tornado, starting a few hundred yards E of GWX radar and officially rated either EF1 or low EF2, may have been an EF4+ tornado based on an extreme tree damage swath in an area the ground survey team didn't reach, and aligning with extreme low level velocities from the insanely low level scan from GWX. An interesting prelude to the need for upcoming tree damage DI revisions perhaps?

This is a very interesting read. I do hope that precedents are being set by work such as this. Bassfield is a tornado that comes to mind.

 

[locomusic01]

I swear I saw some of these on an old website since lost to time, so glad you managed to have some at your disposal!
Also, do you have any photos of damage from the 1971 Waverly, LA tornado of the Delta outbreak that later went on to damage several communities in Mississippi. I've found plenty of photographs of the damage in Delta City, Inverness, Pugh City and the other areas devastated on the Mississippi side but nothing from the Louisiana side where the F5 damage was reported.

No I don't. The Delta outbreak is another one of those "why the hell isn't this better documented?!" events I'd love to dig into more at some point. I mean there's stuff out there obviously, and some of it is pretty impressive, but I haven't come across much from the very hardest-hit areas. I'm sure a concerted effort could probably turn up a lot.

 

[locomusic01]

Yikes, those photos from Moore '13 show perhaps the most extreme vehicle mangling since...Moore '99 (which I consider the poster child for F5 vehicle damage, namely that photo of the pickup stripped to the frame and wrapped around a power pole).

If it weren't for obvious clues (technology, newer vehicles, etc.) it'd be almost impossible to tell the difference between the hardest-hit areas from each tornado. And not just with respect to vehicles, but vegetation and structural damage too. It's actually pretty uncanny. I always find it really weird that some people confidently proclaim one or the other was clearly stronger.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

No I don't. The Delta outbreak is another one of those "why the hell isn't this better documented?!" events I'd love to dig into more at some point. I mean there's stuff out there obviously, and some of it is pretty impressive, but I haven't come across much from the very hardest-hit areas. I'm sure a concerted effort could probably turn up a lot.

I tried Louisiana state archives, no luck.
I found a ton of photos of the MS damage through their state archives, though.

 

[pohnpei]

So... I think many of us remember the remarkable intense tornadoes surrounding GWX radar on the night of 4/13/19? The Hamilton, MS high end EF2 being the highest officially rated of the tornado family due to the extremely rural area of impact. A study is forthcoming suggesting the latter tornado, starting a few hundred yards E of GWX radar and officially rated either EF1 or low EF2, may have been an EF4+ tornado based on an extreme tree damage swath in an area the ground survey team didn't reach, and aligning with extreme low level velocities from the insanely low level scan from GWX. An interesting prelude to the need for upcoming tree damage DI revisions perhaps?

This is really interesting and I do wonder If the rating could be changed due to this kind of research beacuse the EF1 or 2 rating of this tornado was simply untenable.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

No I don't. The Delta outbreak is another one of those "why the hell isn't this better documented?!" events I'd love to dig into more at some point. I mean there's stuff out there obviously, and some of it is pretty impressive, but I haven't come across much from the very hardest-hit areas. I'm sure a concerted effort could probably turn up a lot.

Even TornadoTalk's article on it isn't that great....although they might do an upgraded version at some point down the road.
So many outbreaks from the 70s seem to be poorly documented.

 

[SouthFLwx]

Does anyone here have good pics from the 2014 Vilonia tornado? I need them for a post on Twitter.

 

[pohnpei]

Does anyone here have good pics from the 2014 Vilonia tornado? I need them for a post on Twitter.

when It was near Vilonia.

 

[SouthFLwx]

Thank you, do you also have any notable damage pics?