Monday, December 26, 2011

Top 10 Tornado Facts

Since moving to Texas, I am surprised to find many Texans think Kansas has more tornado's then any other state. That as I recalled from grade school (5th grade) when we studied tornadoes and had a map in the back of class was/is not the case. However, I needed to find out for sure. That was a long time ago. So I began my search online.
Here is what I found. From the Tornado Project we look at tornadoes from a number of angles and find Kansas is never above 4th place. Take a look at the chart below (that I have recreated from their website):









RankTotal numbers of tornadoesDeaths per 10,000 sq milesNumber of killer tornadoesTotal tornado path length per 10,000 sq milesKiller tornadoes as a % of all tornadoesAnnual tornadoes per 10,000 sq. miles
1TexasMassachusettsTexasMississippiTennesseeFlorida
2OklahomaMississippiOklahomaAlabamaKentuckyOklahoma
3FloridaIndianaArkansasOklahomaArkansasIndiana
4KansasAlabamaAlabamaIowaOhioIowa
5NebraskaOhioMississippiIllinoisAlabamaKansas
6IowaMichiganIllinoisLouisianaMississippiDelaware
7MissouriArkansasMissouriKansasNorth CarolinaLouisiana
8IllinoisIllinoisIndianaIndianaMichiganMississippi
9South DakotaOklahomaLouisianaNebraskaNew YorkNebraska
10LouisianaKentuckyTennesseeWisconsinMassachusettsTexas


As Mark Twain once said, "There are lies, damn lies, and statistics! The statistics above are what I believe, not the myths that many people believe. Yes, Texas is a part of Tornado alley, even if many here Texas don't think so.

So what about the deadliest Tornadoes? The Tornado Project has statistics for that as well witch I have again recreated below:

Rank State(s) Date Time Dead Injured F-Scale Town(s)
1 MISSOURI/ILLINOIS/IOWA March 18, 1925 1:01 PM 695 2027 F5 Murphysboro,Gorham, DeSoto
2 LOUISIANA/MISSISSIPPI May 7, 1840 1:45 PM 317 109 F? Nachez
3 MISSOURI/ILLINOIS May 27, 1896 6:30 PM 255 1000 F4 St. Louis, East St. Louis
4 MISSISSIPPI April 5, 1936 8:55 PM 216 700 F5 Tupelo
5 GEORGIA April 6, 1936 8:27 AM 203 1600 F4 Gainesville
6 TEXAS/OKLAHOMA/KANSAS April 9, 1947 6:05 PM 181 970 F5 Glazier, Higgins, Woodward
7 MISSISSIPPI April 24, 1908 11:45 AM 143 770 F4 Amite, Pine, Purvis
8 WISCONSIN June 12, 1899 5:40 PM 117 200 F5 New Richmond
9 MICHIGAN June 8, 1953 8:30 PM 115 844 F5 Flint
10 TEXAS May 11, 1953 4:10 PM 114 597 F5 Waco


As you can see, even here Kansas doesn't rank in the top 5, but neither does Texas. One thing though, Kansas doesn't even make the deadliest list without including parts of Texas with it.  So why do people in Texas think that Kansas has more tornadoes? Who knows, because there is no grain of truth to it.


Fast Facts
  1. Kansas - Highest number of F5 tornadoes since 1880
  2. Iowa - Greatest number of F5's per square mile
  3. Alabama - Highest percentage of tornadoes rated as of significant intensity
  4. Kentucky - Highest percentage of all tornadoes ranked as violent (F4 or F5)



---------- My name is Kevin, and that's what I think. What do you think? Agree? Disagree? follow us on Twitter

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