Some damage photos of this tornado:
I always want to say that the scouring damage of Philadelphia EF5 was one of the most Incomprehensible and inexplicable damage in the history. It certainly help the tornado to attain EF5 rating and make it in the "one of the strongest in the tornado histroy list". But also, the continuity of this intense damage had some kinds of uncertainty based on the pictures can be seen. But lack of aerial photo, this was something that I am not sure of. There were debarking from these pictures, but just not that level that I would anticipate for this level tornado with this kinds of scouring. The trees and the whole environment nearby was also not very muddy which can be seen in every other strong scouring tornados like Jarrell or Moore. The damage of trees in the background of the photos was confusing as well. The guess of mine was that there was extremely strong downdraft or updraft winds(likely downdraft) at this point but not the horitonal winds. DOW3 once detected downdraft winds over 60m/s inside 1998 Spencer tornado and mentioned that far greater downdraft winds can occurred in the most extreme cases. So I would imagine that downdraft winds of the tornado in this place was like some kinds of electric drills cut deep into the ground. Anyway, winds given by EF scale was defined as horitonal winds inside the tornado .
Wow that last picture seems to be for sure EF4 damage(Brice Wood is my 2nd account by the way) Don't know if there was anchored bolts but the house getting swept away definitely means there was EF3 plus winds at the surface.
It was likely some kinds of SBO building which can only be rated EF0-EF2 in EF scale. Vegatation damage nearby was not severe.
That was likely an outbuilding or barn foundation. Structural damage to homes along the path of this tornado didn’t exceed EF2 strength, though like you mentioned, it was likely much stronger than that.
Mangum was the day of that absolutely apocalyptic environment that never took off across most of the high risk, so that day absolutely fully supported extremely violent tornadoes. The other big tornado of May 20th (aside from the giant after-dark wedge EF2) the EF3 near near Odessa, TX, left extensive ground scarring and apparently only hit oil field equipment, so it's very likely both big daytime tornadoes were very violent. Boggles the mind how historic that day could have been.
Yeah I'm still kinda reeling over 5/20 even from an armchair perspective, having most of a 95% all probs watch see partly cloudy skies and almost nothing in the open warm sector of one of the most violent parameter days the plains will ever see is hard to imagine. The chaser situation especially aggravating I can certainly imagine. Good for most of Oklahoma that didn't have to suffer a 5/3/99 on steroids, but from a met standpoint baffling.
Mom said her father went to help with this tornado after it hit and said there were probably more deaths but they were either not found and there was probably not an accurate count of the black people who were killed.
Yeah, many Dixie events likely have highly-underrated fatality counts as African-American fatalites were rarely documented by newspapers or doctors, and many people who succumbed to their injuries months later would likely not be followed up on. Really makes you wonder as to the true "deadliest" tornado in American (or world) history.
Yeah, it seems reasonable to believe that Tupelo likely had 250+ deaths in the city.
