Wow!!

Incredible footage just posted as a huge Tornado near Tuscaloosa, AL seems to just slide by Alabama's huge 101,000 seat Bryant-Denny Stadium

State of Alabama has been slammed by multiple twisters today...hope everyone is ok.

Tornado Footage shot from an Univ of Alabama Apartment Complex

Here's some first hand account video of tornado damage in Tuscaloosa
http://www.twitvid.com/Q5YJ0

Crazy, there are tornadoes everywhere!

Mother nature can be a REAL mother at times...

That sent chills through my body...

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) -- The death toll from a system of ferocious storms that spawned tornadoes as they roared across the South has risen to 193 people as Virginia and Tennessee officials raised their counts for each state.

Here's an unbelievable terrifying footage from the Tuscaloosa tornado.

This one is pretty intense as well.

http://vimeo.com/22970879

The death toll in Alabama now stands at 213...

(04-28-2011 09:21 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  The death toll in Alabama now stands at 213...

To put that in perspective, the one-year record for tornado deaths is 366, which occurred in 1974. 213 in one day, in one state, is shocking. And it's only April.

(04-28-2011 07:56 AM)KnightLight Wrote:  Here's an unbelievable terrifying footage from the Tuscaloosa tornado.

Not sure if that guy is dumb as hell or has balls of steel. Great footage for us to see either way. And thx for sharing.

Why does it seem like Tornado's are stagnant when I watch vids on them? Is that an optical illusion or something? I've seen one funnel cloud, and a couple of real small water spouts. Definitely can't say I've seen anything like that.

I have seen something like that, and it's a terrifying sight, especially when it's headed in your direction and you hear the freight train coming. You have to hunker down, hold on, and pray you aren't sucked up into the air by the tornado's fury...

(04-28-2011 07:56 AM)KnightLight Wrote:  Here's an unbelievable terrifying footage from the Tuscaloosa tornado.

Yeah that guy has some balls hanging around to video that, and by the time that tornado hit Birmingham it was bigger, much bigger.

Well supposedly we had a tornado here in Jersey about 2 hours ago about 15 miles west of where I live. Very rare for tornadoes in the northeast as many know. We were also put under a tornado warning where I live but it was rescinded.

(04-28-2011 10:42 AM)CD11 Wrote:  

(04-28-2011 09:21 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  The death toll in Alabama now stands at 213...

To put that in perspective, the one-year record for tornado deaths is 366, which occurred in 1974. 213 in one day, in one state, is shocking. And it's only April.

Yeah, we had a fair bit of destruction from that day in 1974. In fact, you can still see the affects of the damage at a couple of local parks. Up until then, it was assumed that tornadoes could not hit Louisville because it is in a valley. In 1974, it was learned that not only can tornadoes hit in the river valley: they cannot get out of the valley, and just roam back and forth and quadruple the damage.

(04-28-2011 11:30 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  I have seen something like that, and it's a terrifying sight, especially when it's headed in your direction and you hear the freight train coming. You have to hunker down, hold on, and pray you aren't sucked up into the air by the tornado's fury...

The scary thing about chasing a tornado, is they often change directions with no rhyme or reason. And depending on the angle you are at, you often cannot tell if they are coming towards you until it is too late.

I have been in two tornadoes, driven through three, and seen two additional ones up close. My mom was nearly sucked up in one of the nasty tornadoes of '74, as her office was right across the street from Cherokee Park, which still shows the destruction to this day. When we have tornado warnings, which is every April, I usually just go outside and watch for them. At this point, when I see a tornado, I more or less just say "what up," and it asks how my family is doing. However, none of the ones I have been in were near as big as the ones that hit Alabama.

(04-28-2011 01:06 PM)adcorbett Wrote:  

(04-28-2011 10:42 AM)CD11 Wrote:  

(04-28-2011 09:21 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  The death toll in Alabama now stands at 213...

To put that in perspective, the one-year record for tornado deaths is 366, which occurred in 1974. 213 in one day, in one state, is shocking. And it's only April.

Yeah, we had a fair bit of destruction from that day in 1974. In fact, you can still see the affects of the damage at a couple of local parks. Up until then, it was assumed that tornadoes could not hit Louisville because it is in a valley. In 1974, it was learned that not only can tornadoes hit in the river valley: they cannot get out of the valley, and just roam back and forth and quadruple the damage.

(04-28-2011 11:30 AM)bitcruncher Wrote:  I have seen something like that, and it's a terrifying sight, especially when it's headed in your direction and you hear the freight train coming. You have to hunker down, hold on, and pray you aren't sucked up into the air by the tornado's fury...

The scary thing about chasing a tornado, is they often change directions with no rhyme or reason. And depending on the angle you are at, you often cannot tell if they are coming towards you until it is too late.

I have been in two tornadoes, driven through three, and seen two additional ones up close. My mom was nearly sucked up in one of the nasty tornadoes of '74, as her office was right across the street from Cherokee Park, which still shows the destruction to this day. When we have tornado warnings, which is every April, I usually just go outside and watch for them. At this point, when I see a tornado, I more or less just say "what up," and it asks how my family is doing. However, none of the ones I have been in were near as big as the ones that hit Alabama.

I know Louisville got that F4 that hit Freedom Hall and I think the fairgrounds.... how many others hit the area that day in '74?

I grew up about 15 miles southwest of Xenia, Ohio, which was ground zero of one of the worst tornadoes of that outbreak. The Arrowhead division and downtown Xenia apparently still don't look the same, according to my parents and the locals. Poor Xenia gets hit with a lethal tornado something like 600% more frequently than an average midwestern town.

Before I moved to DC, where people freak out/call a storm "historic" if there's 20mph wind gusts, I used to drive out to Iowa for about 5 days every spring to chase with some friends from the Univ of Oklahoma. We saw some crazy tornadoes out there, and the Tuscaloosa one last night reminded me of something you'd see on a bad day in the plains, but never in the southeast.

(04-28-2011 01:36 PM)CD11 Wrote:  I know Louisville got that F4 that hit Freedom Hall and I think the fairgrounds.... how many others hit the area that day in '74?

Cherokee Park was wiped out. Had many 100+ year old treas taken out. A neighborhood called Northfield was obliterated. Brandenburg, which is a city a bit south of Louisville was destroyed as well.

There is a website dedicated to that day called April31974.com

Here is a bried Synopsis from wikipedia

Brandenburg, Kentucky tornado

The Brandenburg tornado, also producing F5 damage, touched down in Breckinridge County at 4:25 pm CDT and followed a 34-mile (54 km) path. First producing F3 damage at the north edge of Hardinsburg , the storm intensified as it moved into Meade County, producing F5 damage as it swept through Brandenburg, along the Ohio River before dissipating in Indiana. 31 were killed in the storm including 18 at a single block of Green Street in Brandenburg.[18] The vast majority of homes and businesses including the High School, the Baptist Church, the old bank building and the Meade Hotel were either damaged or destroyed. The radio station WMMG (AM) was also destroyed. Sadly, the citizens of Brandenburg had received very little warning, which may account in part for the tragically high death toll; it has been reported that the only warning received by listeners to WMMG was when the disc jockey on duty looked out the window, saw the twister coming, and shouted at his listeners to take cover, shortly before the twister destroyed the radio station.[citation needed]

Several tombstones in the Cap Anderson cemetery were toppled, broken and even some were displaced a small distance. Most of the trees vanished as well.

A complete description of homes and other structures destroyed in order by the tornado in Brandenburg can be found here.[19]

When the twister struck on April 3, 1974, many of the Brandenburg residents at that time had also experienced a major flood of the Ohio River that affected the area in 1937 as well as numerous other communities along the river, including Louisville and Paducah.

The same storm would later produce tornadoes in the Louisville metro area.

Louisville tornado
About an hour after the Brandenburg tornado, an F4 tornado formed in the southwest part of Jefferson County near Kosmosdale. Another funnel cloud formed over Standiford Field Airport, touched down at The Kentucky Fair and Exposition Center, and destroyed the majority of the horse barns at the center and part of Freedom Hall (a multipurpose arena) before it crossed Interstate 65, scattering several vehicles on that busy expressway. The tornado continued its 22-mile (35 km) journey northeast where it demolished most of Audubon Elementary School and affected the neighborhoods of Audubon, Cherokee Triangle, Cherokee-Seneca, Crescent Hill, Indian Hills, Northfield, Rolling Hills, and Tyler Park. The tornado ended near the junction of Interstates 264 and 71 after killing two people, injuring 207 people, destroying over 900 homes, and damaging thousands of others. Cherokee Park, a historic 409-acre (1.66 km2) municipal park located at Eastern Parkway and Cherokee Road, had thousands of mature trees destroyed. A massive re-planting effort was undertaken by the community in the aftermath of the tornado.

In addition to the two fatalities directly associated with the event, two other deaths were indirectly associated; a heart attack in the immediate aftermath and a construction worker who fell while repairing Freedom Hall two weeks later.[citation needed]

Dick Gilbert, a helicopter traffic reporter for radio station WHAS-AM, followed the tornado through portions of its track including when it heavily damaged the Louisville Water Company's Crescent Hill pumping station, and gave vivid descriptions of the damage as seen from the air.[20] A WHAS-TV cameraman also filmed the tornado when it passed just east of the Central Business District of Louisville.[21]

WHAS-AM broke away from its regular programming shortly before the tornado struck Louisville and was on-air live with John Burke, the chief meteorologist at the National Weather Service's Louisville office at Standiford Field when the tornado first descended. The station remained on the air delivering weather bulletins and storm-related information until well into the early morning hours of April 4. As electrical power had been knocked out to a substantial portion of the city, the radio station became a clearinghouse for vital information and contact with emergency workers, not only in Louisville but across the state of Kentucky due to its 50,000-watt clear-channel signal and the fact that storms had knocked numerous broadcasting stations in smaller communities, such as Frankfort, off the air. Then-Governor Wendell Ford commended the station's personnel for their service to the community in the time of crisis, and Dick Gilbert later received a special commendation from then-President Richard Nixon for his tracking of the tornado from his helicopter

There is also a listing for Xenia, but it is really long.

Scary stuff. Between this and what's happening in Japan, nature is not happy. I experience minor earthquakes all the time here but these Tornadoes look a lot more scarier. I have bite the bullet and purchased earthquake insurance.

(04-28-2011 01:51 PM)adcorbett Wrote:  

(04-28-2011 01:36 PM)CD11 Wrote:  I know Louisville got that F4 that hit Freedom Hall and I think the fairgrounds.... how many others hit the area that day in '74?

Cherokee Park was wiped out. Had many 100+ year old treas taken out. A neighborhood called Northfield was obliterated. Brandenburg, which is a city a bit south of Louisville was destroyed as well.

There is a website dedicated to that day called April31974.com

Here is a bried Synopsis from wikipedia

Brandenburg, Kentucky tornado

The Brandenburg tornado, also producing F5 damage, touched down in Breckinridge County at 4:25 pm CDT and followed a 34-mile (54 km) path. First producing F3 damage at the north edge of Hardinsburg , the storm intensified as it moved into Meade County, producing F5 damage as it swept through Brandenburg, along the Ohio River before dissipating in Indiana. 31 were killed in the storm including 18 at a single block of Green Street in Brandenburg.[18] The vast majority of homes and businesses including the High School, the Baptist Church, the old bank building and the Meade Hotel were either damaged or destroyed. The radio station WMMG (AM) was also destroyed. Sadly, the citizens of Brandenburg had received very little warning, which may account in part for the tragically high death toll; it has been reported that the only warning received by listeners to WMMG was when the disc jockey on duty looked out the window, saw the twister coming, and shouted at his listeners to take cover, shortly before the twister destroyed the radio station.[citation needed]

Several tombstones in the Cap Anderson cemetery were toppled, broken and even some were displaced a small distance. Most of the trees vanished as well.

A complete description of homes and other structures destroyed in order by the tornado in Brandenburg can be found here.[19]

When the twister struck on April 3, 1974, many of the Brandenburg residents at that time had also experienced a major flood of the Ohio River that affected the area in 1937 as well as numerous other communities along the river, including Louisville and Paducah.

The same storm would later produce tornadoes in the Louisville metro area.

Louisville tornado
About an hour after the Brandenburg tornado, an F4 tornado formed in the southwest part of Jefferson County near Kosmosdale. Another funnel cloud formed over Standiford Field Airport, touched down at The Kentucky Fair and Exposition Center, and destroyed the majority of the horse barns at the center and part of Freedom Hall (a multipurpose arena) before it crossed Interstate 65, scattering several vehicles on that busy expressway. The tornado continued its 22-mile (35 km) journey northeast where it demolished most of Audubon Elementary School and affected the neighborhoods of Audubon, Cherokee Triangle, Cherokee-Seneca, Crescent Hill, Indian Hills, Northfield, Rolling Hills, and Tyler Park. The tornado ended near the junction of Interstates 264 and 71 after killing two people, injuring 207 people, destroying over 900 homes, and damaging thousands of others. Cherokee Park, a historic 409-acre (1.66 km2) municipal park located at Eastern Parkway and Cherokee Road, had thousands of mature trees destroyed. A massive re-planting effort was undertaken by the community in the aftermath of the tornado.

In addition to the two fatalities directly associated with the event, two other deaths were indirectly associated; a heart attack in the immediate aftermath and a construction worker who fell while repairing Freedom Hall two weeks later.[citation needed]

Dick Gilbert, a helicopter traffic reporter for radio station WHAS-AM, followed the tornado through portions of its track including when it heavily damaged the Louisville Water Company's Crescent Hill pumping station, and gave vivid descriptions of the damage as seen from the air.[20] A WHAS-TV cameraman also filmed the tornado when it passed just east of the Central Business District of Louisville.[21]

WHAS-AM broke away from its regular programming shortly before the tornado struck Louisville and was on-air live with John Burke, the chief meteorologist at the National Weather Service's Louisville office at Standiford Field when the tornado first descended. The station remained on the air delivering weather bulletins and storm-related information until well into the early morning hours of April 4. As electrical power had been knocked out to a substantial portion of the city, the radio station became a clearinghouse for vital information and contact with emergency workers, not only in Louisville but across the state of Kentucky due to its 50,000-watt clear-channel signal and the fact that storms had knocked numerous broadcasting stations in smaller communities, such as Frankfort, off the air. Then-Governor Wendell Ford commended the station's personnel for their service to the community in the time of crisis, and Dick Gilbert later received a special commendation from then-President Richard Nixon for his tracking of the tornado from his helicopter

There is also a listing for Xenia, but it is really long.

Can't believe I forgot about the Brandenburg tornado as well. I've listened to the Dick Gilbert broadcast a few times, and he really did do an amazing job.

If anybody is interested, the following site tracks tornado paths for (allegedly) every confirmed touchdown since 1950.

http://www.tornadopaths.org/

Yesterday's paths aren't in there yet (though the basic info is) but its entirely possible that the Tuscaloosa tornado was on the ground through between 3 and 5 states, which is mind-boggling when you consider that the states down south are not the least bit small.

Because of the tornados in Tuscaloosa, U. of Alabama has closed the semester. Students have the option of either taking the grade they have in their classes right now or taking a final exam at a future date. Students have been sent home.