Xenia tornado (NWS photo)
The Weather Channel’s Tornado Week begins today. A fitting day. April 4th is the anniversary of the Super Tornado Outbreak of 1974, which is still the worst tornado outbreak in US history. From Ottawa to Georgia, 148 tornadoes weaved a path of destruction 2500 miles long, killing 330 people, and injuring more than 5,000.
Six of those tornadoes were F5′s on the Fujita Scale, with winds over 261 miles per hour. Places like Xenia Ohio never stood a chance against winds like that. There were no tornado sirens. Personal emergency alert systems that notify people by radio, cell phone, etc weren’t yet available. And the meteorologists didn’t have advanced doppler radar, they had WWII-era radars that were better at picking up solid objects than wind speeds and direction. This NOAA webpage has some nice links showing the differences in technology since then. In 1974, a tornado had to be on the ground & someone had to witness it, locate it, and call the authorities who may or may not have been in touch with the weather service. More often than not, the weather guys only learned of a tornado after it had already done it’s damage.
I was six years old that weekend, living in rural Illinois. One of the 148 tornadoes hit nearby Decator. I remember only bits and pieces. Impressions. Scenes that may or may not go together, or that may be separated by hours, days, or months.
- I was riding the bus home from school one day (Friday, April 3rd?). The bus driver didn’t like the clouds he could see on the horizon, so instead of driving us rural kids all over the county, he stopped at Dairy Queen just outside of town & we ate ice cream til the winds died down. I vaguely remember becoming aware that glass windows could be blown out.
- Then there was the late afternoon/early evening when my mom & two sisters & I went to the basement & sat in a corner with a blanket over our heads. The baby wouldn’t stop crying. Our ears rang. Dad kept going up the stairs to look around outside, which terrified mom so it terrified me. Besides, I had seen the Wizard of Oz and I knew what could happen!
- My plastic swimming pool ended up in a tree a mile away.
- There was one particular night when the air was so hot and still. It felt like badness. I got out of bed and went to the living room where my parents were glued to a radar screen on the TV that didn’t seem to tell anybody anything at all. It was green and made me think of submarines.
As a result, I learned that grownups can’t always protect you, they don’t know what to do sometimes, and that nature should be both feared and respected. Or God. I wasn’t sure. So I refused to sleep at night if it was rainy or windy. This behavior was only reinforced, of course, when we moved to Texas and barely escaped the damage of the Red River Tornado Outbreak of 1979. Again, all the adults could do was put us in a hallway and make us cover our heads.
The cure for me was a basic meteorology class at the University of Texas in 1995. I was almost 30, and Troy Kimmel taught me enough that I learned to sleep in the rain if it wasn’t associated with a supercell or other favorable conditions for tornadic development. Thank you, Troy.
It’s reassuring to me now, too, that the Weather Channel’s Severe Weather Expert, Greg Forbes studied under tornado expert Ted Fujita, that he was on the ground studying the hardest hit areas in the aftermath of the 1974 outbreak, and that according to Wikipedia, he’s the guy who discovered that hook echoes on radar can produce the strongest storms.
As the 2010 tornado season kicks off I encourage everyone to be alert to weather conditions, have an emergency plan, and keep your loved ones informed as to how to protect themselves from tornadoes. I’d also like to say how much I love living in Seattle where wind storms are about as bad as it gets (so far!). Stay safe everyone!
Learn more:
- April 3, 1974 website dedicated to the Super Tornado Outbreak
- Wikipedia page about the Outbreak
- Tornado safety page - What to do if you’re at school, at home, out shopping…
- Tornado myth page
- FEMA tornado page
Thanks for another fantastic blog. Where else could I recieve this kind of information written in this type of incite full way? I own a project that i’m at the moment implementing, and that i have already been searching for similarly info
Thanks Shoshana! It was a life-changing event for many!
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I lived in Decatur Illinois on Shadow Lane durring the out break of 1974 My mom brother and I were on our way up to Bloomington Illinois to meet up with dad who was on one of his business trips for transamerica insurrance company i was only 4 years old at the time me and my brother were getting antsy as usual when on road trips
when the tornado went through our neighborhood i am glad to say when that tornado was over our house was still standing but others in our neighborhood werent so lucky one of our friends hurt her foot from the broken glass
it was the first time i had ever seen a tornado and the damages it can cause well since my dad worked for transamerica insurrance he took some photos of the aftermath and me beeing one who likes adventure went with him after he got home when he heard about it
so me and my dad went through the neighborhoods
that were hit close to our house and some how we got seperated and for me beeing four i was scared since the neighborhoods that were hit didnt look the same luckily for me one of our friends seen me walking around and asked me if i was ok i told him that me and my dad gotten split up
and that i was lost so he took me to a neighbors house
and dropped me off i still remember it like it was yesturday
the tornado and that destruction it was cool but pretty darn scarry at the same time
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