Wichita Kansas and tornados

Deb and Ed M wrote:

Trackrig wrote:
If you can see it commng directly for you and you know you're going to get hit, but it's still a couple miles away, couldn't you try to get out of the way? Isn't a tornado fairly slow moving?

NEVER try to outrun a tornado - they are FAST (can move 50 mph) and can change course in the blink of an eye. Furthermore, when you see the pictures of tornadoes on TV, they are always moving from the left to the right - the photographer is on the south side (dry side) of the funnel as it moves away. Quite often, the leading edge of a tornado is rain-wrapped, so you won't see the funnel until it's too late. Or...as in the case of my sis-in-law: the tornado can be unrecognizable as a tornado. She was standing in the dining room, watching the hail with her 2 yr-old son, and looking at a particularly black cloud. Finally, when the F-5 tornado was close enough to make her ears pop, she headed for the basement, and her house was destroyed before she hit the bottom step. (Plainfield, IL 1990)

I was recently reading a book about an outbreak of F-5 tornadoes that hit Michigan in 1956; and the majority of people who were injured or killed, had tried to outrun the funnels in their cars.

And lastly - if you try to dodge one tornado - you might drive into the path of another one, depending on what kind of storm system is creating them.

The good news: they usually come with ample warning, especially with the new Dual-Pol radar. Most are small and have narrow destruction paths. A stout building will survive most close passes by a funnel, so your best bet is to protect yourselves from flying debris - and in an RV park, there will be a LOT of that.

It is not just the new generation RADAR but also the highly trained spotters (SkyWarn) that give better warnings.

I remember Plainfield rather well. It is the benchmark tornado for the spotters and disaster teams in this area.

I spent about two weeks in Plainfield providing communications for the Salvation Army Disaster team.