Scary US storms

[Chidoro]

Hope everyone is doing OK out there. The past week has been brutal w/ tornadoes and such
http://www.weather.com/outlook/videos/i ... nado-20459

[Winnow]

230+ dead. That's a HUGE number of dead for tornadoes in one day.

Tornadoes scare me the most out of all natural disasters. Glad I don't live in tornado country. The most we get are dust devils which can get big but rarely bad enough to endanger lives.

[Fairweather Pure]

We get tornadoes in Michigan but deaths are ultra rare. When I lived in Arkansas it seemed like every time a tornado touched down it killed people. Furthermore, in Arkansas I experienced 3-4 huge killer tornadoes a season. That also does not happen in Michigan. Oh yeah, we also have BASEMENTS in the north!!!

[Canelek]

I remember all sorts of tornadoes from growing up in Little Rock. We even had one on Christmas Eve one year (1980?). Crazy!

Never seen anything like this though!

[Leonaerd]

Are basements not the norm in most of the country? +1 for Michigan!

[Aslanna]

Are basements not the norm in most of the country? +1 for Michigan!

They aren't. Especially in the south. I am in Indiana and there isn't one where I currently live. So if a tornado comes through there's really no place to go.

[miir]

No basement = cheaper

If there's no frost line to deal with, builders generally don't build basements in homes.

[Canelek]

I recall maybe knowing 3 or so people with basements in Arkansas.

Out in the country, underground storm shelters are the norm. In cities, folks pretty much go the the SW(?) corners of their homes and barricade a closet. This was mostly to protect from flying debris. Can't do much about an entire home being destroyed.

Good rule of thumb: Stay away from trailer parks, swap meets and railroad tracks.

[Boogahz]

Yeah, you aren't going to find the right type of soil to build basements in many places

[Winnow]

No basement = cheaper

If there's no frost line to deal with, builders generally don't build basements in homes.

Does the ground ever thaw in Canada? I picture a huge Icewall along the border of US and Canada sort of like the one in A Game of Thrones.

[miir]

Does the ground ever thaw in Canada?

Never... we're in a perpetual deep freeze.

[Aslanna]

Global warming... Everything is thawing.

[Boogahz]

No basement = cheaper

If there's no frost line to deal with, builders generally don't build basements in homes.

It has more to do with it not being a good idea in the first place around here. There is generally a hard stone like Limestone only inches below ground. You aren't going to be building a basement into that if you have any sense. It doesn't just have to do with how much more work would have to be done, but you are generally going to end up with water leaks because of the high water table. Then there is the soil....generally a clay-type that will constantly expand and contract. That motion and pressure does not play well with the cement.

[miir]

Global warming... Everything is thawing.

Canada is exempt.
We have a fuckton of regulations protecting us from things like global warming and ketchup flavoured Doritos.

[Fairweather Pure]

No basement = cheaper

If there's no frost line to deal with, builders generally don't build basements in homes.

There is no cheaper way to add square footage to a home than by starting with a basement when building. I don't know of a house around me that does not have a basement. They're the norm in Michigan. In Arkansas, it came down to the the type of soil, or should I say rock. It isn't freely feasible at all to build basements there. Even the outdoor storm shelters do not go down that deep at all, and are more like holes dug out of the ground!

[Aabidano]

Water table in most of the SE US is too close to the surface to have a basement. Head up into southern MO & AR and they've got to blast in many areas to put in a basement, the practice just never caught on.

[Asheran Mojomaster]

I live in Alabama and this was nuts. A lot of people I know are homeless now. A friend of mine in Tuscaloosa had the house ripped up from around him, and when he walked out after it saw debris everywhere and even a few bodies...that tornado set a new record for time \ distance on the ground and probably for strength too (may have been up to 270 mph winds, and EF5 starts at 200).

It has been a sobering couple of days here. I am just glad that I was not hit, and my heart goes out to all of those who were.

[Winnow]

I live in Alabama and this was nuts. A lot of people I know are homeless now. A friend of mine in Tuscaloosa had the house ripped up from around him, and when he walked out after it saw debris everywhere and even a few bodies...that tornado set a new record for time \ distance on the ground and probably for strength too (may have been up to 270 mph winds, and EF5 starts at 200).

Where was he in his house that he managed to survive? When a house is getting ripped apart, it doesn't seem like a human would stand much of a chance.

[Boogahz]

It can be totally freakin random.

[Asheran Mojomaster]

I live in Alabama and this was nuts. A lot of people I know are homeless now. A friend of mine in Tuscaloosa had the house ripped up from around him, and when he walked out after it saw debris everywhere and even a few bodies...that tornado set a new record for time \ distance on the ground and probably for strength too (may have been up to 270 mph winds, and EF5 starts at 200).

Where was he in his house that he managed to survive? When a house is getting ripped apart, it doesn't seem like a human would stand much of a chance.

Just standing in the middle. It ripped the house off the top of his head but he was completely fine. His sister too. It is actually pretty common...there were lots of people in their houses with no basement that had them ripped off them. Some were lucky like him, some were thrown and injured or hit by debris, and the unlucky ones were killed.

[Fairweather Pure]

Winnow, haven't you ever heard weird, random tornado stories? Man, I've heard enough in my lifetime. The one I remember most was when a tornado destroyed an entire home except one wall, that had the china cabinet and all it's china intact as if nothing ever happened. I also remember one where a woman was carrying her baby and the tornado ripped the baby out of her arms and it ended up hung from a power line.

Here's a modern example of my first story from just last Friday!



and here's a take on the baby one from 2008:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/w ... 330804.ece

An 11-month-old baby was found alive in a field after being sucked up by a tornado and thrown the length of a football field.

The boy’s mother did not survive the storm, which was one of a number of tornados and thunderstorms that have killed at least 55 people and injured 150 others in the South, the highest such death toll in a decade.

The National Storm Prediction Centre in Norman, Oklahoma, said as many as 69 tornados raged this week across Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama and Indiana, many doing their worst damage as voters went to the polls on Super Tuesday.

The man who found the baby at first thought that he was a doll. “As soon as I saw his little butt cheeks move I hollered, ‘It’s not a baby doll. It’s alive!’ ” said David Harmon, a fire fighter with the Wilson County Emergency Management Agency in Tennessee.

The tornado had shredded through several homes just off Highway 25 in the Castalian Springs area of Sumner County. John Poss, a paramedic, examined the child for injuries. “I touched every part of that baby, thinking he was hurt,” Mr Poss said. “He was a blessed young man.” It is thought that the baby was thrown 100 metres or more. He was later taken to the Monroe Carell Jr Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, Nashville, where he was treated for minor facial bruising and declared a miracle.

The baby has been identified as Kyson, the son of Kerri Stowell, 23, who was killed by the storm and was found near a local post office. Ms Stowell’s father, Doug, said: “It’s a miracle they ain’t both gone. We’ve had some divine intervention.”

Phil Bredesen, the Governor of Tennessee, said that he was shocked by the intensity and scope of a storm that “just literally sat on the ground”, covering an area 400 miles (650km) wide.

Local TV stations have been broadcasting dozens of remarkable survival stories. Barry Newberry, a town constable in Lafayette, Tennessee, said: “It will take 15 years to clean everything up. But the people here will never be the same.” He had arrived to help neighbours along a road where every house had been destroyed. “Everybody was running around like they were drunk. They were just dazed and devastated.”

President Bush will travel to Tennessee today to survey the storm damage and offer support. Many homes are still without electricity and in Hartsville, Tennessee, a natural gas facility caught fire. The death toll of this week’s storms rivals that of a series of tornados in 1999 when about 50 people were killed.

Tornados typically kill about 70 people in the US every year.

Tornados are fucked up!

[Boogahz]

I heard one couple talk about how they were in a tanning bed while the rest of the house swirled away.