I suspect a number of the tornadoes rated F5 on the original F-scale were overrated. I think they have done well with rating tornadoes EF5 using the EF-scale though I believe the Chickasha, Goldsby, Vilonia, Rochelle, and Chapman tornadoes should have been rated EF5.
Guin took forever to find decent damage photos of- i think it took until that video on that page was discovered. That was way back on the old TW in the "strongest Tornado Ever" thread. That was a good thread, wish it could've been archived.I might as well put my money where my mouth is.
So, this blog here has some B&W pictures of damage done by the Guin tornado, yeah, this definitely looks pretty intense in parts, quite a bit of debris granulation:
April 3, 1974 – The Guin Tornado
I was barely a year old on April 3, 1974 when the Super Outbreak – then the largest recorded tornado outbreak in United States history – occurred. Even if I had been older, living in U…mwenzbauer.wordpress.com
This was rated F3, spawned by the same supercell system that caused the Elie, Manitoba tornado (Canada's first and last F5, since they adapted the EF scale back in 2013). This thing had an impressive multivortex structure and I think the F3 rating was only because it traveled only largely uninhabited terrain, only doing damage to two homes and a barn shed and apparently an F3 was the best rating the surveyors could give it, at least according to their use of the scale and the structural integrity of the buildings it hit.
Maybe this was the image you mentioned. It just near the first picture which been given 200 mph in NCDC database.
Could have been crawlspace walls, too, especially if they were cinderblock. But those aren't really that common in the south, are they?
Honestly I have a few questions to raise about all of the officially-rated F5 tornadoes in 1990. Hesston was borderline, since most of the houses swept away were not especially well-anchored, with only a couple being very well-built. I agree completely that Goessel was massively overrated.
No this was someone else. With that said, those claims made by the poster you are referring to almost certainly untrue as well.
www.facebook.com
Yeah those mentioned did tear off chunks of foundations, but the idea of a tornado actually tearing entire slabs out of the ground is pretty absurd. That has never happened. Rumors of that happening are associated with Guin, Tanner, and Lawrenceburg, and it just isn't true.
Given how uh, liberal some of the interpretations of F5 damage were back then, I'm really surprised none of the Palm Sunday 1965 tornadoes was rated F5. There are a few that have better cases than some other tornadoes which were rated F5.
I think 2-3 were initially rated F5 but later downgraded to F4. Still quite surprising either way.
Not only was the scouring in Plainfield impressive, but for being only around 10 yards it threw half of a semi and a few cars great distances. The other two monsters in June of 1990 seem like good candidates for an F5 rating or EF5 rating on todays scale.
RWSOS>2.0.CO;2
Wow!!!!
