On Friday night, a storm front spawned tornadoes along a line stretching northeast from Greensburg through central Kansas. At least three tornadoes touched down from this storm including the one that hit Greensburg.There are aerial views of the damage area that shows that the tornado that hit Greensburg was a mile wide at times. At least nine people are dead, and there are fears that since many people could still be trapped in cellars and rubble, the death toll could rise. About 95% of the town was destroyed, and another wave of potentially severe weather is possible in the area this afternoon. The hospital was destroyed by the tornado, and people are having to be transported to a nearby hospital where there are already 16 people with critical injuries there. A mandatory evacuation was ordered for the town. Read more about the tornado at KAKE's website. The image on the left is a picture of the damage that the town suffered, courtesy of USA Today.-Amanda (13 Weather Intern)
Here are some graphics from KAKE-TV's dopper radar before the storm struck Greensburg. This has to be one of the most impressive tornado signatures I've ever seen. In addition, on the second graphic you can see the velocity of the winds. The doppler radar was indicating a rotating windspeed of more than 200mph...which was confirmed when the damage was assessed. -ERIC
4 comments:
Couple of comments...
1. I think its amazing that so many people SURVIVED. Obviously a lot of folks did something right:
a. NWS did issue a warning in plenty of time.
b. town had sirens that did alert people, who...
c. did take shelter in appropriate places.
While the destruction of a town and the loss of life is a tragedy, I think the real lesson to be learned from this tornado is that it is possible for SO MANY to SURVIVE even such a massively destructive storm.
...and 1 question ...
Given that almost everything else was flattened, how come that tall elevator in all the photos seems to have been unscathed? You'd think something tall sticking up like that would have been more vulnerable.
They said on the "Today" Show this morning that it was a wedge tornado. What is a wedge tornado?
A wedge tornado is a tornado with a large-diameter base. Most tornadoes are very narrow at the base...with damage confined to a small area. This tornado was nearly TWO miles wide!
I know the record size for a tornado is 2.5 miles... it was on storm stories. Thats HUGE.
And that radar picture is insane, how tightly wound and defined the rotation is. I played that game once where you try to find rotation... I was terrible at it haha and even i woulda been able to issue a warning for that one.
And eric - on Saturday i was pretty disappointed to see your lawn empty except for a few things from the people upstairs. But oh well, I was broke.
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