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Is the last photo an anchor-bolted home that was swept away? Hard to tell due to the image size and quality.Not as widely discussed about like those insanely violent tornados in OK several hours ago, Etna ar tornado on May 25 2011 definitely also had some violent contextual damage
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I don't know but from what I can see it may have had plate straps instead. I think anchor bolts would be visible here as those are wider and would cast shadows helping highlight them.Is the last photo an anchor-bolted home that was swept away? Hard to tell due to the image size and quality.
Apologies for dredging this up, but someone recently asked about this and I'm trying to find some (any) documentation regarding the cameraman dying here. All help appreciated.Filming tornadoes is and will always be a risky task but the lack of knowledge about tornadoes in the 1950's and earlier made filming them that much more dangerous. The (in)famous video of the 1953 Warner Robins, GA tornado abruptly cuts when the cameraman is either swept off his feet or drops his camera and runs for cover, and he was unfortunately among the fatalities.
Nope, just a (very widely believed) urban legend. Some of the Georgia papers ran stories on the man who shot the film a while after the event; I don't remember his name now but he was very much alive. IIRC, his home was damaged but I don't think he or his family were hurt.Apologies for dredging this up, but someone recently asked about this and I'm trying to find some (any) documentation regarding the cameraman dying here. All help appreciated.
Phil
Storms A and B from May 3, 1999. Storm A produced 14 tornadoes. B produced 20.Unrelated but does anyone know of some of the most cyclic/most tornado producing supercells? The most I’ve been able to find was from the 2007 Greensburg supercell which produced a ridiculous 20 tornadoes and 9 different cycles from Protection-Greensburg-Holyrood KS. Another one that comes to mind was during the May 23, 2008 outbreak where supercell “J” dropped 15 tornadoes from Englewood-Greensburg-Great Bend KS. There’s probably been a couple more I’m missing but again those two seem to be the most I’ve been able to find.
Yeah knew I was probably forgetting some lol. Storm B every tornado except for Mulhall was short lived and didn’t surpass F2 intensity but still 20 tornadoes is insane. I actually made a typo with the Greensburg storm its listed as having produced 22 tornadoes instead of 20.Storms A and B from May 3, 1999. Storm A produced 14 tornadoes. B produced 20.
I remember seeing a paper that has a table breaking down the top 3-4 most prolific cells. IIRC (which I probably don't) I wanna say the Cordova supercell was tops at 9. As you said, the long tracks cut down on the numbers for individual cells.Has anyone ever done an official, full (at least the PM storms) supercell-by-supercell breakdown of 4/27/11? I don't think any storm that day was quite that prolific in terms of numbers, simply because most of the tornadoes were so long-tracked.
Yeah the Cordova cell was the most prolific violent tornado producer that day. First dropped the Philadelphia MS EF5 then spawned a brief EF1 before crossing into Alabama where it produced the very long track Cordova EF4 that probably had EF5 potential at some point, and then dropped a second EF5 that hit Rainsville, crossed into Georgia and produced the Ringgold-Apison EF4. If I recall correctly it also might’ve produced the Chilowee Lake TN EF4 and another long tracked EF3 in TN but I’m unsure if it was the result of a cell merger or not. Still that’s some unreal stuff.I remember seeing a paper that has a table breaking down the top 3-4 most prolific cells. IIRC (which I probably don't) I wanna say the Cordova supercell was tops at 9. As you said, the long tracks cut down on the numbers for individual cells.
I really do appreciate all the work and time you put into these articles I could never have the patience to do what you do lmao. Honestly think you write up some of the most detailed and fantastically written articles on historical tornado events that I’ve ever read and I’ve read quite a bit. Little bit of a random fact but this one channel on YouTube that’s pretty popular called ‘Horror Stories’ uploaded a video about the Tri-State Tornado a while back and used your write-up as pretty much the main source for information, that video wound up getting 680,000 views which I thought was really cool considering they pretty much just read straight out of your article lol. Anyways here’s a link to the video for anyone interested:"Just do New Richmond," they said. "It'll be quick and easy," they said.
So, a few quick updates. I've made it to downtown New Richmond! It turns out the initial section of the path, from the south end of Lake St. Croix to New Richmond itself, is almost certainly three separate tornadoes based on eyewitness accounts + a bunch of damage points.
The first tornado formed over Lake St. Croix near "Catfish Bar," just south of St. Marys Point, MN. It traveled about 6.5 miles altogether, roughly half of it over the lake. It seems to have been fairly intense, reportedly debarking a grove of trees on the lakeshore and "blowing away" a couple of (probably not well-built) homes. It injured at least 5-6 people but didn't kill anyone.
The second tornado was slightly wider but only ~3.5 miles long, flattening a handful of houses and destroying a bunch of barns, outbuildings, etc. It also killed several dozen cows and horses and reportedly carried one half a mile, but again it didn't kill any people.
The third tornado is New Richmond, which apparently grew extremely quickly in both size and intensity, claiming its first life barely half a mile after touching down. Its path was much wider than is normally reported, especially around the Boardman area, where several people reported the damage was every bit as intense - if not more so - than in the city itself.
In downtown New Richmond, the deaths were of course incredibly concentrated. I haven't even added half of the total fatalities yet, and it already looks like this:
Btw, this doesn't even include the two buildings with the highest death tolls, where so many were killed that I'm still trying to figure out the numbers. Some of the victims were in conditions that were.. let's say not easy to count, so there's a lot of conflicting info. Possibly as many as 16 people may have died in one hotel, though I'm skeptical it was quite that high.
Anyway, New Richmond's central business district was packed at the time of the tornado, which means just.. so. many. POIs.
It seems the tornado may have cycled again just after leaving town and crossing Mary Park Lake, but I haven't really gotten that far yet. In fact, I suspect there were at least two or three additional tornadoes because damage continues for at least another 40-45 miles northeast of town. Speaking of which, it's weird that Grazulis and most other sources list the final tornado of the New Richmond family as having lifted somewhere around Clear Lake. The towns of Arland, Barron and Cameron (13, 23 and 28 miles NE of Clear Lake, respectively) were all 100% hit by tornadoes - possibly even the same tornado, but I'm not sure yet.
Arland was "wiped off the map." It was pretty tiny and likely not well-built, but a few people were injured and livestock was thrown hundreds of yards and killed. Multiple blocks in Barron suffered substantial damage. A few homes and at least two businesses were leveled/blown away; one woman was killed and her husband and neighbors were badly hurt. The damage in downtown Cameron was apparently pretty moderate, but I've found multiple reports that there was "great destruction" in the surrounding countryside.
In any event, the total damage path for the New Richmond family covers anywhere from 68 to ~90 miles, depending on whether the earlier tornado near Hastings, MN was from the same supercell or not. Pretty sure it was but not 100% yet. Too early to give any hard numbers on the overall death toll, but it's almost certainly higher than the official 118. Probably not way higher, but I'd expect it to end up somewhere around 125-130. There may have been as many as nine deaths NE of Boardman alone, where officially there were only three.
I really do appreciate all the work and time you put into these articles I could never have the patience to do what you do lmao. Honestly think you write up some of the most detailed and fantastically written articles on historical tornado events that I’ve ever read and I’ve read quite a bit. Little bit of a random fact but this one channel on YouTube that’s pretty popular called ‘Horror Stories’ uploaded a video about the Tri-State Tornado a while back and used your write-up as pretty much the main source for information, that video wound up getting 680,000 views which I thought was really cool considering they pretty much just read straight out of your article lol. Anyways here’s a link to the video for anyone interested:
Thanks man, I appreciate it.I really do appreciate all the work and time you put into these articles I could never have the patience to do what you do lmao. Honestly think you write up some of the most detailed and fantastically written articles on historical tornado events that I’ve ever read and I’ve read quite a bit. Little bit of a random fact but this one channel on YouTube that’s pretty popular called ‘Horror Stories’ uploaded a video about the Tri-State Tornado a while back and used your write-up as pretty much the main source for information, that video wound up getting 680,000 views which I thought was really cool considering they pretty much just read straight out of your article lol. Anyways here’s a link to the video for anyone interested:
I spend far, far too much time watching YouTube, anything "tornado" worth seeing and some other stuff tooVideo would open up some really cool possibilities with animated maps and whatnot as well, especially w/Google Earth Studio + After Effects. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself again.
Thanks man, I appreciate it.
I don't think I've ever seen this before. That's one of the reasons I've been thinking about experimenting w/videos - people are way more likely to watch a 10-20 min video than to read a novel masquerading as a blog post. This one's had almost exactly 17x the number of views in three years that my article's had in nine lol
Video would open up some really cool possibilities with animated maps and whatnot as well, especially w/Google Earth Studio + After Effects. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself again.