Be sure to keep the residents of Oklahoma in your thoughts and prayers. The televised videos of the destruction are hard for me to watch. We have friends on this forum from Oklahoma. One poster that comes to mind is ok4450. Let’s especially keep him in mind. Those of us who regularly visit this forum know that he is an important member of our forum family.
Yes, as soon as I saw the devastation in OK, I thought about ok4450.
Let’s pray that he, his family, his home, and his business are all safe.
I’ll second that.
I’ll third that. If you’re out there ok4450 let us know how things are looking.
I expect he’s out there helping folks and keeping busy. Any how I’ll keep him and his family in my prayers.
Ed B.
Mile wide F5 tornado I heard. Too many catastrophes going on for my liking.
It was pretty brutal, and still is. Thank you all for your concern but I moved out of the OKC metro area some years ago and I’m fine. The path of that tornado was about 3 miles south of where I used to live. What made the Monday tornado so bad is that the area it hit is very populated. My niece lives in Moore a mile from the path so she was very lucky.
The previous day’s Sunday tornado was overshadowed by the Monday tornado. My daughter lives in Edmond, which is the northern suburb equivalent of Moore, and the Sunday tornado developed 5 miles west and then went south of her by 2 miles. In that case, thankfully it did not intensify until crossing the Interstate and most of the trail after that was open ground.
About 15 years ago one went directly over my house and luck was on my side then. The tornado lifted off the ground about 2 miles south, went directly overhead, and touched back down about 5 or 6 miles north of me. The sound was similar to being under a railroad trestle when a freight train goes over.
Quite a few years back I got caught in a tornado at night while going through a small town and I can honestly say that it’s the only time in my life that I was scared to death. As odd as it sounds, the thought of dying was not scaring me; it was that I about to die and didn’t know why. I simply had no idea I was in the middle of a tornado until later that evening after I made it home in a battered pickup and saw the late evening news report.
Glad to hear you and your family are safe.
3 MILES??? You make it sound like it was far away. I would have wet my pants if it was that close.
Glad you and your family are OK.
It’s good to know that you and yours are well, @ok4450. The devastation is enormous. An aerial view showed several blocks of homes obliterated.
Glad to hear you’re okay.
Oklahoma has been enduring F-5 tornadoes since it was Indian Territory…The only difference now is the media coverage and everyone with a cell phone or I-pad sending in streaming video, making it look like the entire state was devastated…Storm Chasers make a living off this, it’s an industry…
Another difference is we have a lot more stuff (vehicles, houses, infrastructure) exposed to obliteration at the hands of Mother Nature when she decides to hit the warpath. Read about the Tri State Tornado of 1925 and your hair will stand on end. Not to diminish those who have suffered a loss but it’s a miracle that more people were not killed or seriously injured in this one.
.The only difference now is the media coverage and everyone with a cell phone or I-pad sending in streaming video, making it look like the entire state was devastated
That and the population is 100 times larger then it was 100 years ago.
Again, thanks for the comments but I would just clarify that the Edmond and Moore tornados were not that close to me as I live north of the metro. My daughter and niece missed them by a few miles so there were some anxious moments for my wife and I.
It was interesting to watch that Moore tornado form real time. From a nub to a cone, back to a nub, then a cone again and eventually a funnel.
One of the OK City news helicopter pilots was providing the shots and was some miles away from it. He stated that at one point he had gone into a hover and was being sucked in at 38 knots airspeed by the inflow of air into the funnel.
I’m in agreement that it’s amazing more people were not killed or injured than there were. A live shot of Sante Fe avenue showed a traffic jam of headlights with people trying to get out of the way and that tornado could be seen crossing through that jam with headlights disappearing.
I wasn’t born yet for that
@bscar2–I remember this tornado outbreak well. I live in east central Indiana. One high school was completely destroyed. There were no students in the building, but a couple of teachers were there. Fortunately, no one in the building was killed or even seriously injured.
looking through wikipedia I seen one outbreak in 2003 that had 401+ tornadoes, then a few years later, around the same time, 385 tornadoes
@bscar2 - I was in Cincinnati at the time, and while I don’t remember the scope of it, I remember standing in the yard with my dad looking at the bizarre clouds. No damage near us, thankfully.
It was so different then, no ‘Weather Channel’, or weather radar, for that matter. Just news stories that had to be pieced togehter