Here it comes. Over the last couple decades,
There it goes.
Crossing the road. Hauling ass!
Over the last couple decades...
I found myself trying to outrun some fast tornadoes.
What exactly is considered a fast tornado?
and how fast can tornadoes move?
I'm part of a scientific field operations team with the objective
of gathering near-surface wind field data close to tornadoes
In aggregate we've tallied around 100 years of tornado chasing
and in that time we've seen some freaky stuff.
In this video the team and i will discuss five scary fast tornadoes.
each one with a forward moving velocity faster than the previous.
including a mind-blowing new world record for the fastest tornado ever recorded.
On April 29th 2017 I was monitoring a deadly tornado outbreak
in the forested terrain around Canton Texas.
There it is. Big daddy! coming right this way.
i gotta run, gotta run. It's coming, it's coming fast.
It's going fast!
Little too close.
These tornadoes were moving up to 37 miles per hour.
That's not slow but it's not terribly fast either.
The miscalculation that got me in trouble was that the burrito I was targeting dissipated
and another monster suddenly materialized closer to me.
What I thought was one tornado moving really fast
was actually two separate tornadoes.
You may think you can easily outrun a burrito moving over 30 miles per hour.
Assuming trees aren't blocking your path,
blinding wind and rain isn't whipping across the road,
hail isn't smashing your vehicle
and there's no traffic.
Near a tornadic storm there's a good chance you'll have to contend with these elements
and always factor in another burrito could develop closer to you.
The majority of burritos I encounter track roughly 25 to 30 miles per hour.
For me, anything slower than that I consider slow
and anything faster than say 39 miles per hour, I consider a fast tornado.
But tornadoes can move much faster than that. Right Jennifer?
Indeed they can as Skip Talbot and I observed near Tupelo Mississippi.
We found ourselves in similar conditions as Hank's last account
in that high precipitation storm modes and trees
made for terrible visibility and risky chasing.
Around 2:15 p.m we were racing toward Tupelo Mississippi trying to head off a tornadic storm.
When we cleared the trees and were first able to get eyes on the tornado
the base was so low that the roiling grey mass of tornado looked like a wedge.
It looks both huge and violent.
(Jennifer) Skip, oh my god! (Skip) Wedge!
It's a big wedge! Give me the motion! Left or right? Which way is it moving?
The lack of left or right motion made it obvious that we were in the tornado's path.
We could see the gray mist moving through the trees and the cyclone surging overhead.
it was coming in very fast
(Jennifer) It's too close!
(Skip) Ok! Yeah, let's go!
(Jennifer) Yeah we gotta go. It's right on us.
Wow!
(Jennifer) Ok, keep going! C'mon, Cmon.
It's on us, We gotta move fast.
(Skip) We're moving. We're clear. This is RFD.
Almost immediately we were impacted by rear flanking downdraft (RFD) and inflow winds
wrapping around and into the tornado.
Our vehicle bucked and rocked as we plowed through the severe winds adjacent to the tornado while I snapped photos.
The tornado tracked roughly 31 miles in 38 minutes
Giving it an estimated ground speed of 49 miles per hour.
With winds up to 150 miles an hour,
this ef-3 rated tornado damaged or destroyed more than 300 homes and businesses.
There were 40 injuries and surprisingly only one fatality associated with this storm.
As formidable as this tornado was the terror doesn't come close
to that afflicted by the great tri-state tornado of 1925.
Dr Tracie Seimon will elaborate more about this incredibly fast-moving historic nightmare.
On Wednesday March 18, 1925
A highly visible funnel appeared under a classic supercell thunderstorm at 1pm near Moore Township Missouri.
Shortly after the deadliest tornado in u.s history would claim its first life.
Town after leveled town would endure a horror unlike anything the world has ever seen.
After crossing into Illinois, the parent storm transitioned to high precipitation mode
obscuring the intense tornado behind a curtain of rain
while the strength and size of the tornado increased.
With wind estimates perhaps in excess of 300 miles per hour
this tornado obliterated the towns directly in its path while racing across the landscape at an average speed of 62 miles per hour.
Entire rows of homes were leveled and swept away.
Schools were devastated. Railroad tracks were reportedly ripped from the ground and
sheets of iron were carried as far as 50 miles away
in rural areas farmhouses were also leveled, trees were debarked
and the tornado carved deep scours into the earth indicating this tornado
would have easily earned the highest intensity rating on the Fujita scale. An f5.
Back in 1925 there were no technologies yet available to detect tornadoes
nor systems in place to warn the public.
even using the word tornado in forecasts and warnings was banned by the u.s weather bureau at the time
to prevent panic among the public.
Many victims likely had little or no warning before the tornado struck.
Between the obliterated town of Gorham and the highly devastated town of Murphysboro
the mile wide tornado raced at an incredible speed of 73 miles per hour
and for a long time it was recognized as the fastest tornado ever recorded.
In its wake large fires burned structures with trapped victims inside thousands were left without shelter or food as looters raided the rubble.
After three hours and 38 minutes of unspeakable horror the tornado or family of tornadoes
finally dissipated at 4:38 pm near Petersburg Indiana.
Along a 235 mile damage path approximately 15,000 homes had been destroyed
and 695 men women and children lost their lives.
By far the largest death toll registered by any U.S. tornado.
To the present day almost 100 years later America still hasn't seen anything like that terrible Wednesday in March 1925.
So we know that the great tri-state tornado of 1925 calculated to be 73 miles per hour was fast.
but let's examine some revealing calculations highlighted in this next tornado.
(Hank) In more recent years, many of us recall unbelievable scenes of tornado horror times two...
The day of the twins near Pilger Nebraska.
(Greg Johnson) That's not good.
(Hank) The small town of Pilger took a direct hit from this violent EF4.
Close by to the east another almost identical EF4 develops
and together they carve a parallel path of terror across the countryside.
(Daniel Shaw)Two tournaments on the ground at the same time.
I think one has directly impacted Pilger.
(Hank) After 12 miles the eastern twin dissipates in a rainy mass
but the Pilger twin refuses to die.
Can still see that other tube in there.
It emerges from the rain as a thin writhing rope but again intensifies
to inflict more EF4 damage to a farmstead.
meanwhile to the east another EF4 is being born.
This sets the stage for a mind-blowing stream of events.
Jennifer Brindley and Skip Talbot was also on the scene making some incredible observations.
So yeah, Jennifer and I arrived late on the scene
but unknowingly in perfect position to witness something we could have never expected.
We were intently watching the newly developing Wakefield EF4.
The Pilger tornado emerged from the rain, what we initially thought was a new satellite.
As the tornado roped out it became entrained in the RFD surge feeding the Wakefield EF4.
The rope started to accelerate as it slingshot past the larger multi-vortex tornado.
lightning struck between the burritos and then the ropes started moving so fast
I was literally stunned.
Oh my god look at that satellite! I've never seen anything like this.
When Skip and I were reviewing our footage of the chase
we could not believe how fast that rope was moving.
(Skip) I had never seen forward speed like that on a tornado.
I did some initial calculations and came up with a rough estimate of almost 90 miles per hour.
These speeds and just how exceptional this event was seemed to go largely unnoticed in the community.
I think many people assumed this was a satellite or part of the parent Wakefield tornado rather than its own identity.
(Hank) from my slant the burrito doesn't appear to be moving that fast
but it's also tracking away from me.
From Skip and Jennifer's position the tornado is moving more perpendicular
and man is it cruising!
(Skip) Recently our team decided to re-examine this event in greater detail
and get a better fix on these measurements.
Dr Anton Seimon was able to locate a scar this tornado left on the landscape
visible in google satellite imagery
With precisely synced video from Hank Schyma, Josh Vanden Top, Rob Hurkes and my own
our team was able to triangulate the location of this tornado at key times
and produce highly accurate forward ground speed measurements.
(Dr. Anton) This event which was so visually stunning is also scientifically intriguing.
We expected to find an arcing path consistent with an orbiting satellite circulation,
however the damaged scar showed that the tornado was a pre-existing circulation
that emerged from rain very likely the end stage to the EF4 tornado that it passed through Pilger
It maintained an almost straight path while passing just south of the much larger Wakefield tornado.
We applied techniques from the El Reno survey to analyze the videos
and by using Hank's careful mapping of the fast-moving tornadoes passage-past features seen in each video
we calculated its speed between each marked point.
This refines Skip's earlier work since we now had an actual track allowing us to fix the tornado's positions with precision.
At 4:42 central time the tornado is moving at just 20 miles per hour
and slowly accelerates to 33 miles per hour minutes later.
Then after briefly slowing to 26 miles per hour
it begins a pulsing acceleration to about 62 miles per hour at 4:46 pm when the intense lightning bolt occurs.
(Skip) Holy cow! (Hank) Did i just see that?
The vortex then accelerates extremely rapidly
gaining another 30 miles per hour in just 10 seconds
and at 4:47 p.m we fix its fastest ground speed at 94.6 miles per hour
sustained over 5.33 seconds before equally rapid deceleration starts.
When the tornado dissipates half a minute later it is slow to less than 50 miles an hour.
If you're a storm spotter, chaser or anyone observing a severe storm
keep your head on a swivel to maintain situational awareness.
Don't fixate on one tornado but check your six
so you don't miss the other one sneaking up from behind.
It's what we chasers call the stupid check and we do them often.
The next case is especially notorious.
The May 31st, 2013 El Reno Oklahoma tornado.
Look at the size of that monster.
Skip created this animated graphic of the tornado position
combining weather radar and resulting damage path.
The moving icons represent storm chaser positions.
Note how instead of chasing the tornado everyone's trying to escape it.
This tornado had many unusual characteristics that made it extremely hazardous to storm chasers.
It grew to the largest size of any documented tornado reaching a diameter of 2.6 miles.
It also changed direction several times and underwent a remarkable acceleration to 55 miles per hour
right as it expanded to its maximum size catching many chasers in its circulation
The colossal tornado also featured numerous secondary circulations.
Tornadoes inside the tornado that had their own highly unusual characteristics.
This is going to get really ugly really fast here.
(Shaw) break station bk 2fsrv confirming multivortex wedge extremely dangerous.
(Hank) All five of us were on the scene documenting this freak spectacle.
At first many of us were focused on the sub vortices the oblivious of how dangerous the situation was becoming.
(Tracie) it was hard to even recognize this huge mass as a tornado.
(Anton) Look at that velocity!
(Jennifer) Walls of rain careening at tornadic speeds from left to right.
(Skip) It became apparent that the tornado was much larger than we initially thought.
(Anton) Inconceivably large and moving very very fast.
Go! It's crossing the road just behind us.
(Tracie) and that's when I realized just how close we've been to being injured or possibly killed.
A bunch of faces were hit by that no doubt. Anyone behind us would have been hit.
Dr Anton Seimon led a research project to analyze this exceptional storm
using imagery captured by storm chasers.
The El Reno tornadic supercell was observed by two scientific teams operating advanced mobile research radars.
at the same time hundreds of storm chasers converged on El Reno as the storm developed.
In an effort to harvest the trove of chaser visual data for scientific applications
I convened a group of chaser researchers in a crowdsourcing effort we call The El Reno Survey.
From more than 90 respondents who generously contributed their valuable assets
we were able to assemble the largest archive of visual material ever compiled for a single tornado event.
Then through careful analysis we were able to establish the precise time and location of almost all video segments collected.
The radar teams examining the inner structure of the enormous tornadic mesocyclone
reported the existence of numerous sub-vortices...
tornado strength circulations themselves developing and orbiting along the periphery of the El Reno tornado.
These circulations were tracked in successive radar scans which revealed several undergoing
slingshot accelerations when passing along the south side of the larger tornado
reaching forward motions far greater than ever documented for any tornadic circulations.
Two of these circulations, each the size of a conventional tornado,
were tracked at motions that reached a hard to believe 78 meters per second
which is about 175 miles per hour.
By matching video times and locations with radar data we can now see what a tornadic
vortex moving at 175 miles per hour looks like.
Looking northwest from a distance of 3.7 miles
Skip and Jennifer observed the sub-vortex as it arced around the wedge tornado.
Simon Brewer captured this view of the incredible vortex rocketing directly towards his position
as his chase partner Justin Drake fought severe headwinds while trying to drive them to safety.
We know from the careful analysis by the University of Oklahoma and cswr mobile radar teams
that the exceptionally fast-moving sub-vortices in the 2013 El Reno tornado
are generated within the same mesocyclone producing the record-diameter tornado.
What's more the sub-vortices move in sweeping arcs in the manner of satellite tornadoes
Revealing them to be secondary circulations of the giant tornado.
The Pilger event differs considerably in that a discrete long-lived tornadic mesocyclone
is the parent of the vortex that slingshots past the far larger Wakefield tornado
and the absence of curvature in its track inward towards the larger vortex shows that it did not behave as a satellite circulation.
We therefore conclude that this tornado, being the end stage of the Pilger Nebraska EF4 tornado
that formed 46 minutes earlier should be recognized as the fastest moving tornado yet documented.
Song: La Male'diction De La Danse Du Poulet
Anything else you'd like to add...
No all right good enough.