Significant Tornado Events

[pohnpei]

This one always blows my mind:

Was the first pic also from Joplin? I saved this pic in my computer from old talkweather forum but can't recall any detail or which tornado did this for a long time.

 

[locomusic01]

Was the first pic also from Joplin? I saved this pic in my computer from old talkweather forum but can't recall any detail or which tornado did this for a long time.

Yeah, the photo and video are of the same car. This was near St. Mary's Catholic Church (25th & Moffet IIRC, just west of the high school).

 

[pohnpei]

 

[tornado examiner]

thats a bit ridiculous. there's literally no justification for a lower rating than EF5 so idk what he's on about

 

[CheeselandSkies]

I hadn't really seen or heard much directly from Tom Grazulis since a couple of interviews in mid-'90s Weather Channel documentaries. Some of his tweets seem unnecessarily cryptic/unclear. Disappointing.

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

So he downgraded it or is he listing another tornado from the outbreak as an F5?

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

So he downgraded it or is he listing another tornado from the outbreak as an F5?

Oh man, if he goes EF4 for Vilonia then there's no hope. I'm wondering if Marshall or associates intimidated him into doing this...

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

 

[MNTornadoGuy]

Oh man, if he goes EF4 for Vilonia then there's no hope. I'm wondering if Marshall or associates intimated him into doing this...

Nah I don’t believe that at all. Also something I noticed is that he lists an F5 from the Apr 1982 tornado outbreak which in his original book he has it as an F4. I think he is using some SPC data for his outbreak rank.

 

[buckeye05]

Disappointed to hear Grazulis is back-pedaling on this. I wonder what (or who) made him decide to change his mind? Hopefully the very questionable nature of the rating is at least addressed.

 

[Shakespeare 2016]

Oh man, if he goes EF4 for Vilonia then there's no hope. I'm wondering if Marshall or associates intimated him into doing this...

Probably like you said backlash from other people. Even if he does receive backlash from other people what does he have to really lose?

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Summer employees....that explains why so many ratings back then were inconsistent, using underpaid/unpaid college interns to rank historical tornadoes before the scale based on newspaper photographs and eyewitness accounts is a recipe for disaster.

Source: college student/unpaid intern who hates his future job/academia prospects lol

 

[Lake Martin EF4]

Disappointed to hear Grazulis is back-pedaling on this. I wonder what (or who) made him decide to change his mind? Hopefully the very questionable nature of the rating is at least addressed.

It was mentioned somewhere that escapes me that he was working with Tim Marshall for the book. I can guarantee Tim Marshall had a say with Vilonia's downgrade

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

It was mentioned somewhere that escapes me that he was working with Tim Marshall for the book. I can guarantee Tim Marshall had a say with Vilonia's downgrade

Great....not sure I'm gonna bother buying the new book then (whenever it comes out, that is); maybe Tom will go on the record later saying Vilonia should've been EF5 but who knows if that will happen...I was also hoping he'd side with Chickasha, Goldsby, and Chapman 2016 as being EF5, but now I'm not so confident.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

This one always blows my mind:

Been looking for that one with the balled up car; don't see that too often. Only other times I can think of it happening are with Flint-Beecher, Bridge Creek-Moore and possibly some tornadoes of 4/27/11 but not sure.

 

[Lake Martin EF4]

Great....not sure I'm gonna bother buying the new book then (whenever it comes out, that is); maybe Tom will go on the record later saying Vilonia should've been EF5 but who knows if that will happen...I was also hoping he'd side with Chickasha, Goldsby, and Chapman 2016 as being EF5, but now I'm not so confident.

Yeah the same dude that rated Chapman EF4 (Because Tuscaloosa tore up railroad tracks, helpfully ignoring it was a bridge) does not inspire confidence. At a guess, I can pretty much say for sure SIGTOR2022 will also have Moore 2013 as the most recent EF5.

 

[locomusic01]

Summer employees....that explains why so many ratings back then were inconsistent, using underpaid/unpaid college interns to rank historical tornadoes before the scale based on newspaper photographs and eyewitness accounts is a recipe for disaster.

Source: college student/unpaid intern who hates his future job/academia prospects lol

The entire tornado rating enterprise (both current and historical) is kind of a dumpster fire tbh, for all sorts of reasons. That's why mentally I tend to just sort tornadoes into a few basic bins; something like the current "significant, strong, violent" classifications except without the associated rating thresholds. Maybe also another category like "historic" or something to account for the handful of tornadoes that stand out above the rest.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

Yeah the same dude that rated Chapman EF4 (Because Tuscaloosa tore up railroad tracks, helpfully ignoring it was a bridge) does not inspire confidence. At a guess, I can pretty much say for sure SIGTOR2022 will also have Moore 2013 as the most recent EF5.

Great, and I was hoping Grazulis was gonna set things straight. I wonder if he'll upgrade some old F-scale tornadoes that occurred post-La Plata (like Harper, KS and Marion, ND, both in 2004) but my hope for this gets lower every moment now.

 

[Juliett Bravo Kilo]

The entire tornado rating enterprise (both current and historical) is kind of a dumpster fire tbh, for all sorts of reasons. That's why mentally I tend to just sort tornadoes into a few basic bins; something like the current "significant, strong, violent" classifications except without the associated rating thresholds. Maybe also another category like "historic" or something to account for the handful of tornadoes that stand out above the rest.

Grazulis has 6 categories:

• "significant"
• "intense"
• "major"
• "extreme"
• "historic"
• "super"

Really, historic and super are pretty much the same thing, but who knows?

Of course, if he sides with EF4 for Vilonia my opinion of him is pretty much done. Lol.

 

[Lake Martin EF4]

Great, and I was hoping Grazulis was gonna set things straight. I wonder if he'll upgrade some old F-scale tornadoes that occurred post-La Plata (like Harper, KS and Marion, ND, both in 2004) but my hope for this gets lower every moment now.

Hey, don't lose all your hope, only most of it. Tom had Worcester at F4 for the longest before going with F5 in 2003.