Norman, Oklahoma is in the heart of Tornado Alley.?ÿ They mentioned late last night that Norman had been hit again while the news crew was focused on damages around Fairland and Wyandotte.?ÿ We were fortunate enough to only get a little rain and 70 mph winds.?ÿ A lot of damage was done by the storm that I first saw reaching from Amarillo, Texas?ÿ to the center of Nebraska.?ÿ That bright red little strip along the centerline is where the severed damage can occur.
Saw a couple of Norman elementary schools were closed this morning and that at least a dozen people were injured.?ÿ How was the view from your lawn chair on the roof?
Got really close. Two miles is really pretty far away for a tornado, but when it's moving at 50 mph and there's a two or three minute lag on the TV meteorologist's end it can make for an edgy few minutes sitting on the edge of my chair.
There's a casino a mile south of town in Goldsby. My casa is about 4 miles N43dE fom there (a common course for 'naders). When a tornado is reported near the casino I perk up. That happened last night. But the funnel dropped form the meso cyclone about a mile and a half east of there. It then took its forty-something degree diagonal N and E and tore the snot out of a bunch of town. It was close enough my ears popped from the drop in pressure. I have an analog barometer on the wall and it read just a notch above 29 inches of mercury...a very low reading.
Interestingly I had been out just few minutes earlier with the dogs. I heard something I've never heard before. While I've heard "rolling" thunder many times from storms I've never heard fixed and continuous thunder...just a constant roar. I stayed out there about five minutes until it started to rain, but the roar continued. Never heard anything like that before.
All's good here though. I'm sure the next week or two I will see an increase in repair work orders from my electric co-op client.
Great news. You are correct that two miles seems like a lot but some tornadoes have a tail that zigzags like crazy while the core appears to be going straight.
Had a call this morning from a fellow across the county from me to find some pins I set back in 2005. We talked about all the blow and go from last night. He then brought up a story from several years ago when his house was narrowly missed by a small twister. He reported the crushed rock county road near his house had a strip of "swept clean" area about 10 feet wide that would dart from one side of the road to the other and back and forth for a very long stretch. Nothing loose to be found anywhere in the strip.
He told of an incident from his youth when a tornado missed his parent's home but completely destroyed a large hay barn of theirs on another farm two miles to the north. His mother woke up his father in the middle of the night and told him it sounded like there could be a tornado. He listened for a minute and then told her not to worry then promptly fell back to sleep. When a neighbor stopped by in the morning to report on the hay barn and it's contents spread all over kingdom come, he said his mother looked at his father and IF LOOKS COULD KILL, HE WOULD HAVE DIED RIGHT THERE.
I must be related to his father. I would have behaved the same way.
