Tornado Recap

For the first time since early September last year, northern Ohio saw it's first tornado warnings June 15.  Not the latest on record but close. 

Latest first tornado warning in order (after June 1st):

July 24, 2005

June 24, 1999

June 22, 1990

June 19, 2021

June 15, 2023

June 5, 2016

June 3, 1989

June 1, 1987

Not every tornado warning means there were actual touchdowns.  In most instances (75% of the time approximately) the warning is issued due to doppler radar indicated rotation within the storm.  Last Thursday, not only did we have multiple tornado warnings, we had multiple tornadoes!  Here is the list: (h/t Mackenzie Bart and Dontae Jones for the graphic)

NWS statement here

Red dots indicate the approximate location of each tornado

Here is a nice video of a constructed powerpoint of the entire severe storm event via the Iowa State University - Mesonet Site (IEM Raccoon).  88 slides total. 5 seconds per slide. Well worth it.

Video format from youtube

Which Counties See the Most Spring Tornadoes in Northern Ohio?

Add caption

 The tracks of each tornado in each month

VIDEO: Double Tornadoes in Nebraska

Its a rarity to capture DOUBLE TORNADOES on video.


These tornadoes killed two people in Nebraska (first tornado fatalities in Nebraska since 2004) and leveled a significant portion of the town of Pilger 100 miles northwest of Omaha.

These tornadoes were a part of a fairly large severe storm area Monday.

The Palm Sunday Tornado Outbreak in 1965 featured a double tornado. The Detroit NWS Office has a great discussion on the meteorological setup for that event. The May 3, 1999 event in Oklahoma was a larger outbreak resulting in 74 tornadoes had a double tornado.

Photo: NOAA 1965

The tornado outbreak in 1965 was further east than yesterday's event.

Tornadohistoryproject.com

In most instances when two tornadoes form close to one another, one of the tornadoes becomes the dominant player while one dies away. Yesterday, both tornadoes sustained their intensities creating two separate destructive paths. How strong were these tornadoes? The National Weather Service will survey the damage and make a determination soon.

Northern Ohio Severe Weather Recap. ONE TORNADO CONFIRMED

A pretty big weather day yesterday across northern Ohio. Many severe storms with heavy rainfall (2-5"), 1" hail reported & tornado warnings. 

Many people have complained about our "wall-to-wall" coverage saying that nothing was happening and it wasn't worth it. "No tornadoes on the ground so what is the point of coverage like this?" a few said via Facebook and Twitter.  While its easy to lump this event in with all of the others, this round of severe storm was very different than other severe weather events we've had in the recent past in northern Ohio. Why? First, many of the severe cells had the classic hook echo characteristic indicating strong counter clockwise winds which often indicate a tornado. Thankfully, only ONE TORNADO was confirmed in Lorain County. I thought we'd end up with 4 or 5 easily.

Secondly, many cells also had strong changes in wind direction embedded within them. By using the "Velocity Scan", we can determine which cells have rotational signatures by recognizing those small scale wind direction changes. Green colors mean wind moving toward the radar. Red colors mean wind is moving away. Notice the abrupt change and the implied rotation.

For these reasons, the National Weather Service issued tornado warnings. As a public service, it is mandatory to inform the public of the tornado warnings. Given the numerous storms, we needed to break into programming to cover this event BIG TIME! 

For those of you who claim that more tornado warnings are being issued for northern Ohio, that's not the case. After doing some exhausting research compiling tornado warning history, I found that the issuance of tornado warnings at the National Weather Service office in Cleveland, Ohio (our home office) is trending lower since the early 1990s. Also, the percentage of tornado warnings that result in actual tornadoes here in northern Ohio during the same period is comparable to the national average.

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As we recap yesterday's severe weather, its a good idea to review what constitutes a severe thunderstorm as defined by the National Weather Service.

Most storms NEVER reach severe limits. A very small number of severe storms actually produce a tornado. That's comforting news for all of us. That said, the mere mention of the word "severe" has extreme connotations. Many people believe that the word "severe" means "tornado". Nothing could be further from the truth. Here are the tornado facts and figures that I hope set the record straight.

* 5% of storms are severe. Only 1% of storms produce tornadoes

* Tornado warnings are issued for about 75% of all tornadoes

* In 2007, the National Weather Service started to issue warnings on a more local level versus on a county basis. These "polygons" localize the threat inside a specific part of a county.

* Tornadoes occur over a wide spectrum of strengths, sizes, and lifetimes.  Of the 800–1400 tornadoes reported in the United States each year, about 86% can be characterized as weak, 13% as strong, and 1% as violent.  

* In general, weak tornadoes (86%) have lifetimes less than 10 min, widths around 100 m (yards) and paths less than 1.6 km (1 mile) in length.  National Weather Service radars can complete ONE SCAN every 4 to 6 minutes! 

* Typical tornadic wind speeds are on the order 110 mph.   

* The average “lead time” for tornado warnings was less than 5 min in the late 1980s. By the late 1990s, lead time was up to 10 minutes; 13 minutes today (2014)

* National Weather Service forecasters provided a 24-minute lead time for tornado warnings in Joplin, Missouri back in 2011, almost TWICE the national average. 

* According to one study in 1978, there was a 22% probability of tornado detection with a 3 minute warning lead time. By 1998, the probability had jumped to 65%! 

Crying Wolf? I Think Not: Severe Weather Definitions

It never fails.

During and after each and every severe weather event, there are a few people that selfishly say "Where are the storms? You all said we'd have severe weather. All we're getting is wind and some rain. You weather people never get it right!" Nothing gets me more fired up more than idiotic comments like this. Tell this to the families who lost loved ones in this house in Nashville, Illinois.

My blood pressure is climbing just writing this......errrrrr!

I have written many times about how our perceptions and preconceived notions tend to govern our thoughts especially when events occur that seem to support and reinforce our biased notions. I try to tell these individuals that severe weather forecasts are approximations. That's why tornado watches are as large as a state not a city. 

People will think the way they want to think regardless of how much data you present them to the contrary.  How often have our biases surfaced during election years (economic issues), in our day-to-day lives perhaps when we interact with others?  See my posts about cognitive biases and  cognitive dissonance relating it to weather HERE and HERE. Note the parts in red print if you want the Cliffs Notes version.

Anyway, maybe these basic severe weather definitions will clarify some of these misconceptions and perceptions about severe weather. Bottom line is this: When the Storm Prediction Center has a region in a MODERATE to HIGH RISK for severe weather, bad things will happen. This is not something to be taken lightly.

 

Northern Ohio Tornado Outbreak on June 5th and 6th

The tornado outbreak this past weekend across northern Ohio was somewhat of a rarity in that it resulted in fatalities.  The last tornado in northern Ohio that resulted in a death was in 2002. Prior to that, it was in the mid 1980s.

The Wood County tornado in northwestern Ohio Saturday night was upgraded to an EF4 by the National Weather Service.  It first touched down near I-80 and Oregon Road (East of Perrysburg) at 11:15 PM EDT and then moved through the south side of Moline and then near Metcalf Airport. The tornado then crossed the northwest side of Millbury into Ottaway County following Trowbridge Road and lifted at 11:30 PM EDT just west of Clay Center. At least 50 buildings were damaged or destroyed.  Here is a map of the path and damage with the radar loop as the tornado passed through.  The tornado recap is as follows:

The complete update from the National Weather Service is HERE

3 Other tornadoes were also confirmed in northern Ohio. Here is a basic map with path length, width and wind speeds.  The EF4 was the Wood County tornado.  The EF0 moved through Richland county 2 miles north of Lucas.  The northern EF1 tornado touched down southwest of Andover near the intersection of Mann Road and Creek Road traveling ENE.  The southern EF1 tornado developed in Holmes county 2 miels northwest of Berlin and moved southeast to Walnut Creek, Ohio then onto Sugarcreek in Tuscarawas County.  All information is courtesy of the National Weather Service HERE ON THEIR WEBSITE. Click on "previous version" numbers for the details of each tornado.

Niles, Newton Falls Tornado of 1985

It was 25 year ago back on May 31,  1985. A tornado outbreak occurred in northeastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania and New York and portions of Canada. The most intense tornado touched down near the Ravenna Arsenal in Portage County and continued on the ground for almost 50 miles.  It devasted Niles, Newton Falls, Hubbard, killed dozens of people and continued into Pennsylvania.

This tornado was an EF-5, the strongest of all tornadoes with winds of more than 300 mph and a width of a mile and a half.  This was the last EF-5 tornado to hit Ohio and the first since the Xenia tornado outbreak back in 1974.

Thunderstorms began to develop in the late afternoon east of Cleveland as the temperatures rose into the middle 80s.  The upper levels of the atmosphere were ripe with energy. For anoutbreak of severe weather to occur, you need a "dry slot" in the middle of the atmosphere.

This allows the super-humid to "rise" into air that isn't saturated.  If the air in the middle of the atmosphere wasn't dry, storms couldn't have risen and blossomed into severe storms.  In this case, the air was dry all of the way out to Missouri.

The storms didn't look that impressive from space.

By midnight that night, 21 tornadoes had touched town in Northeast Ohio along along with the only F5 tornado (the strongest) in the Unite States.

Here are some great links showing more specifics on the tornado outbreak.  Special thanks to the NWS in Cleveland for the meteorology of that day and these additional sites for their photos and commentary.

http://www.erh.noaa.gov/cle/office/localinterest/1985Tornado/storm_data.pdf

http://www.angelfire.com/pa/pawx/053185.html

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05149/511826.stm

Stormchaser Video from Monday, May 10, 2010

Credit:  www.twisterchaser.net, Northeastern Ohio storm chaser for the video and commentary

More information on this storm chase  HERE at TWISTERCHASER.NET

"Today we chased a mesocyclone from the Western panhandle of Oklahoma into Texas, got some great footage of initial rotation and lightning, this storm did produce 1 tornado but it was on our southwest side and it was rain-wrapped so we couldn’t see it. It eventually weakened but left us with some great photo opportunities and footage, will post those pictures tomorrow, however I did want to post my first official footage clip, this was one of the first tornadoes that touched down on Monday just south of Wakita before all the chaos ensued"

Oklahoma City Tornadoes - May 10th

Monday evening just outside of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, a tornado outbreak began killing 5 and injuring dozens of others.

Here is a photo that my sister's neighbor took as one of these approached the area.  

A brandnew photo of my sister and her kids in the neighbor's storm shelter.  The shelter is approximitely 4 feet by 10 feet.

The National Weather Service office in Norman, Oklahoma created this preliminary map of the tornadoes after the event.  More information about each tornado will be released once severe weather surveyers inspect the damage to determine the intensity of each tornado.

1ST MODERATE RISK/SEVERE WEATHER - CLEVELAND TORNADO WATCH HISTORY

Friday, May 7th marks the first MODERATE RISK issued by the Storm Prediction Center for Northeastern Ohio.  Maybe once a year at best is Northern Ohio under a MODERATE RISK.  What usually follows is a TORNADO WATCH which also doesn't happen in the Cleveland/Akron metro area very often.  How infrequent does it happen?

I scanned the Storm Prediction Center archives for all of the Tornado Watches over the last several years to see if any were issued over the core of Northeastern Ohio.  Surprisingly, I had to go all of the way back to 2006 to find one.

There have been a few tornado watches affecting fringe counties but not many in the center of the area.

Here are the Tornado Watches in reverse order since the last CLEVELAND/AKRON METRO TORNADO WATCH back in 2006:  These maps are created by the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.  Each map has the "WATCH BOX:, counties in watch box with radar.
 

2009 NO Tornado Watches for Northern Ohio

2008 Tornado Watches

2007 Tornado Watches

2006 Tornado Watches

HERE IT IS.  THE LAST CLEVELAND/AKRON METRO TORNADO WATCH

The New Tornado Alley and Ohio Tornado History

Michael Frates, grad-student at the University of Akron mapped out all F3, F4 and F5 tornadoes (the strongest tornadoes) from 1950 through 2006 which stayed on the ground for at least 20 miles. What he came up with is several regions or "alleys" where the strongest tornadoes occurred. First two images courtesy:  Michael Frates

The traditional "tornado alley" through Oklahoma and Kansas still remains and is very accurate.

However, two additional zones of higher frequency of F3-F5 tornadoes he found to exist in the south (Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama), and also in Indiana, central Kentucky and western Ohio.

This also corresponds to the average number of overall tornadoes here.

As we focus on each of the 88 counties in Ohio, the largest number of tornadoes since 1950 is Lorain and Richland counties.

The largest outbreak of tornadoes occurred in April of 1974.   Over a 24 hour period, 147 tornadoes were confirmed from southern Michigan to southern Alabama totalling 2600 miles of tornado path length.  Notice how the strongest tornadoes that day developed in the "new" tornado alley (Indiana and the south).

Back in 1985, eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania and New York was devestated by a series of incredible tornadoes.  Newton Falls and Niles, Ohio near Youngstown were hit by an F5 tornado.11 people were killed marking this tornado outbreak as the most deadly since the 1974 outbreak. 

In more recent times (since 1989), northeastern Ohio has had some strong tornadoes as well.  Each triangle denotes the location and the strength of each tornado on a scale of 0 to 5.  Notice the two F3 tornadoes; one in the Akron area and the other NW of Medina.

So far, this year has been quiet.  Let's hope it stays that way.