At 2:45 of this clip, the meteorologist speculates that a lot of regular programming would be pre-empted that day. He was right; TV stations in the area were on nonstop for many hours on-end. But for Birmingham's TV stations, April 27th, 2011 may have been their "finest hour", and their coverage of the storms likely saved lives.
Actually, I think the west Tennessee outbreak the previous year had a 60% tornado risk. That's the only one that was higher. Still wasn't even close to as bad an outbreak as this one was. One of only two "Super" outbreaks. Scary day.
My house shook several times that day. Especially early that morning when jasper was hit early, when the other storm came through jasper about 2:15 and then when Cordova was hit I could hear the rumble.
Sounds sort of like what happened on April 03, 1974 in Louisville, Kentucky almost 10.0 Hours of Radio Broadcasts from 84 WHAS (840 Khz AM), & at 1 time (97.5 Mhz FM) of continuous tornadic storm reports from Traffic Tracker Dick Gilbert, National Weather Service Meteorologists John Burke, & Dave Reeves. Thursday April 03, 2014 will mark 40 Years since the 1974 Tornado.
@Matt Schlicht: An EF5 tornado only produces EF5 damage for a narrow portion near the core, with progressive bands of EF4, EF3, etc. damage radiating out from the center. The people in Joplin who survived were either underground, got extremely lucky in an EF3 band, or were in EF2 bands and took proper shelter. Those who took EF4 or 5 damage died. It's that simple. The biggest problem with Joplin was the fact that it struck the low-income part of town with the worst quality housing, where it did EF4 damage. It wasn't even doing EF5 damage until it hit the commercial district. Sheltering on the first floor of a 1950s-era low-quality rental house without a basement in an EF4 means you're going to die. That's what happened, in most cases, although a lot of other people got caught in their cars because they ignored two separate sets of warnings. If you're suggesting that EF5 damage is reliably survivable in anything other than an underground storm shelter, you're sadly misinformed.
Orange Joe-- I agree with most of what you said except the part where you stated "it struck the low-income part of town with the worst quality housing..." Do you live in or near Joplin, MO? That monster tornado actually touched down right by a rather posh country club. And the EF-5 damage path from the hospital east for almost 4 miles, was in excess of 5000 feet (almost a mile) wide. Of course the outskirts of many small towns will be lower income but, excluding mobile homes, income doesn't have a lot to do with building structure. I can even cite you one instance in Joplin where a 2-bedroom house, built in 1952, survived the most intense part of the tornado (it did lose its roof and windows) where many homes nearby were swept clean off their foundations. You are 100% correct about "reliably" surviving an EF-5 while above ground. I can assure everyone that those in Joplin that survived the direct hit above ground owe their lives to luck, or fortune, or whatever you believe, because most did not.
There will be an exhibit, & panel discussion about it Thursday April 03, 2014 at the Main Branch of the Louisville Free Public Library. Guest Speakers will include (Retired) Meteorologist Tom Wills, Candace (Gilbert) Medina, & others.
12 лет назад
what do you want him to say, "don't do anything you're gonna die anyway?"
In the future, they need to urge people to have an underground shelter or robust reinforced-concrete building in mind to shelter in when SPC Ultra-High Risk days like this pop up. The best situation here would have been the whole area opening up its doors and trying to provide as much good shelter as possible for this one day. Because the sad truth is that, no, you won't survive an EF4-5 in an above-ground frame house, no matter what room you're in.
Well,... they knew this storm system was coming for days. April 25 caused tornadoes to form in Oklahoma and Texas, and April 26 did the same in Arkansas and Louisiana. They knew there was going to be tornadoes on this day wherever the system ended up, and they knew there would be a possibility of tornadoes entering large population centers, but I don't think they thought that every tornado warning would result in at least an EF2 tornado and that Alabama's largest cities would take direct hits.
And they also were probably not expecting anything near the April 3 1974 tornado outbreak, and they got around 250 tornadoes on April 27 alone, with near 45 tornadoes in Tuscaloosa county. First, downtown Cullman, then they just started coming, eventually hitting Decatour, southern Tuscaloosa, Northern Suburbs of Birmingham, South side of Birmingham, Cordova, and countless others. I think if you were north of the Mobile TV market you took very hard hits, and maybe one tornado formed
You wont, huh? Ask the people of Joplin and El Reno how they survived their EF5 tornadoes then, because Joplin and El Reno homes don't have Underground shelters either.
ABC 33/40 owners are also what some people might not like. To show how much they made the Trump FCC mad search for Sinclair Tribune merger. Sinclair owns this group of stations
