Tornado Ally

Although tornadoes occur in many parts of the world, these destructive forces of nature are found most frequently in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains during the spring and summer months. In an average year, 800 tornadoes are reported nationwide, resulting in 80 deaths and over 1,500 injuries. A tornado is defined as a violently rotating column of air extending from a thunderstorm to the ground. The most violent tornadoes are capable of tremendous destruction with wind speeds of 250 mph or more. Damage paths can be in excess of one mile wide and 50 miles long. Once a tornado in Broken Bow, Oklahoma, carried a motel sign 30 miles and dropped it in Arkansas! 

Before a Tornado: How to Plan

Conduct tornado drills each tornado season.

Designate an area in the home as a shelter, and practice having everyone in the family go there in response to a tornado threat.

Discuss with family members the difference between a "tornado watch" and a "tornado warning." 

Have disaster supplies on hand:

• Flashlight and extra batteries 
• Portable, battery-operated radio and extra batteries 
• First Aid kit and Manual 
• Emergency food and water
• Non-electric can opener
• Essential medicines
• Cash and credit cards
• Sturdy shoes 

What is a tornado?  

A tornado is a spinning funnel of air. A tornado forms when a funnel of warm air quickly rises from the earth, most of the time into a thundercloud. In North America, when cold dry air from the Rockies moves east onto a warm wet air mass flowing north, if strong winds set the upward moving cold air mass of air spinning, it can turn into a tornado. Tornadoes that are over water are called waterspouts, and tornadoes that are over the desert are called dust devils.

Tornado Facts

Tornadoes are known to pick up trees, cars, trucks, farm animals, and anything smaller. Tornado speeds can range from under one hundred mph to over three hundred. A tornado can move along the ground at 70 mph! There is a place in the center of the US called Tornado Ally. This area receives a lot of tornadoes.

Outside Article-
Pipestone Tornado
The day after the Elie and Oakville tornadoes, another powerful tornado touched down near Pipestone. The tornado was followed by many storm chasers for its long nearly 100 mile path. Shortly after touching down, the tornado damaged several homes on the Oak Lake Reserve. This damage was F1. The tornado then continued for many miles over open country, occasionally grazing a structure with minor damage and snapping off many trees. As well, the parent storm occasionally produced baseball-sized hail. At its widest, the tornado was determined to be 1.8 km wide. This determination was made possible because the tornado churned through Spruce Woods Provincial Park, a heavily-forested region. At one point near Hartney, the tornado took out a very old (> 100 years) house that was made of brick. A new house built of brick would almost certainly require an F5 rating but as this home was built late in the 1800s, more than F3 damage could not be assigned. Near the end of its life-cycle, near Glenora, it destroyed a home (not well-built) and also destroyed some trees, garnering its F3 rating. It dissipated shortly thereafter.
Tornado's were spotted Saturday evening near Pipestone, Minto, the Canupawakpa First Nation and an area between Hartney and Deloraine.
Some houses were damaged on the Canupawakpa First Nation.

June 23, 2007;
F3 NW of Pipestone to near Glenora - Large 1.8 km wide tornado damaged many trees and several wheat fields. 1 home was destroyed.

F5 Elie area - Very violent, destructive tornado was spawned outside of the town of Elie and went through the town completely destroying several homes and damaging the town's flour mill. Although this was originally an F4 tornado, it was re-rated to an F5. This was a rare tornado and was Canada's first official F5 tornado.

F3 Near Oakville - As the Elie tornado dissipated, a new destructive tornado developed about 10 miles west of there. The tornado tracked through the country damaging trees and a couple of grain storage bins.


 My Thoughts
Tornado's happen alot during spring time and getting to summer, there's nothing really that we can do to stop them. We just have to be ready for them and get through all the damages that it causes.

I remember the time when the tornado was here. All of my family were looking out our big front window watching the rain and the hailing and the deadly winds. My lil bro, Cristian is only 4 years younger then me but he's not the youngest in the family, and he's scared of alot of things, like almost anything that can hurt him and he was freaking out that our house was gona get taken away by the winds. He's was asking what do we do when the tornado comes down and we told him that we would go in the basement and get under the stairs and wait till it passes but him freaking out, he was like half ways down the stairs already while me and my family were still looking out the window watching.
Nothing did happen to our house but the funnel cloud did go right over our house and touched down somewhere else far away. Later that day people were saying to us that it went over our house and they thought it got wrecked, it didn't we were okay, but they saw it as well that it went over our house. It was cool to watch because we never saw a tornado being formed and watch it touch down, and i hope we will never see one and soon.