When tornadoes are that powerful, it doesn't really matter what your house is built with.

While I was attending college one day we experienced a tornado warning. On my floor there was a foreign exchange student from China and we were explaining to him what was going on. After a moment of contemplation he said "so you have these swirling, vortexes of death that just drop out randomly from the sky?" I had never thought about it in that way, but essentially yes. 🌪️😂

I think something people aren't aware of is that the only reason weather stations know to sound the alarm for a tornado warning is because a storm chaser someplace is risking their life to report it.

I had a houseguest from Germany who couldn't understand Americans' "obsession" with the weather. This is why, Gudrun, those of us who live in tornado alley are obsessed. Sometimes you have mere seconds to take shelter.

I am a storm chaser, so yes, it’s real. Tornado Watch - Conditions are favorable for the formation of a tornado Tornado Warning - A tornado has formed and been confirmed, either by radar or by storm chasers Tornado Emergency - A dangerous tornado is entering a population center and human life is in imminent danger

I was in the Joplin tornado. I lost everything. I was under my house for hours. I lived right behind the hospital. The whole neighborhood was destroyed. Scariest thing I've ever been through

You asked about the storm chasers: they absolutely exist. They aren't all just after 'content' though: they are super helpful for our communities. They chase the storms to alert the weather service of tornadoes on the ground (cause radar can't tell for sure if something is on the ground or recycling in the air), track the tornadoes from town to town, collect invaluable data on the nature of tornadoes, and most importantly - storm chasers are often first on the scene to help with search and rescue efforts. They commonly are in contact with local police/fire departments and also help with blocked roads. Regularly these chasers drive victims to hospitals because ambulance services may not know which roads are blocked with debris. Storm chasers do a LOT more good than most people realize.

What the video doesn't talk about with the Jarrel tornado is that it was so strong, that the dead bodies (human and animal) were virtually pulverized and their skin was shredded from their bodies. It literally peeled asphalt from the ground.

The worst tornadoes are rain-wrapped because you can't see the funnel coming. It just looks like a really bad rain storm. So, I'd rather see that funnel than just a huge black rain/hail storm.

"Going underground" .. that removes you from direct debris blowing at those insane speeds. The same reason soldiers dig foxholes.

Hey there! When he says go underground, he means literal underground storm cellars. A lot of Americans that live in Tornado alley (the mid-west) usually have storm cellars in their yard or close by because of how frequent tornados are in that area of the USA. Many have basements too that can spare them even if their house is mostly wiped away. But an underground storm cellar is usually the best option by far. Also EF4s and EF5s are so scary in part because they can crumble brick walls instantly. That's part of how storm teams classify a tornado an EF4 or EF5 - if they see brick walls and structures completelyed demolished.

I was at the #5 tornado in Jarrell, Texas back in 1997 working for law enforcement and was among the first few people to the scene after the tornado went through the subdivision. I knew people there. With an F5, the destruction and condition of those we found is about what you'd expect if a large aircraft full of people crashed; utterly devastating and beyond belief. We were there working through it for 3 days and nights. It took me about 10 years before I could talk about most of what I saw and had to do. For every one of these tornadoes where there was an extreme loss of life, please remember those who step up to do the hard things to make it better for others. It takes a toll called Post Tramatic Stress Disorder.

No Andre. A Tornado Watch is when they're looking out for tornado's because of the weather. A Tornado Warning means a tornado has definitely touched down in the area (take shelter). A Tornado Emergency means GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE ASAP! Edit: improved formatting.

Ryan Hall on KZfaq is a meteorologist and has a group of storm chasers. They don't do it just for content. It really helps people learn and understand the weather.

I live in Tornado Alley. Since Joplin, we now are warned by our broadcasters that a tornado is not survivable above ground. With this past weekend, I'm concerned about May. It's almost always worse. It doesn't matter what your home is built with in an EF5. They are the most powerful storms on earth and they are life-changing to live through.

Dead man walking is still the craziest looking tornados I’ve seen.

There's a reason why EF5 tornados are sometimes called "The finger of God." What ever it touches basically ceases to exist, be it houses, utility infrastructure, vegetation, etc. The odds of surviving a direct hit without a dedicated storm shelter are often very, very low.

We have many brick houses in America. I live in one. Can't tell you how many brick houses leveled.

Something they don’t mention is that the Joplin tornado lifted an entire hospital building and twisted it off its foundation

I was working as a photojournalist at KOCO 5 when the Moore tornado hit. I was assigned to the school where the children were killed. I saw things I wish I never had seen. And there was one of the largest tornados a week and a half later on the 31st of May that year. The El Reno tornado. It is one thing to see them on the screen, but being there in person is something entirely different. The smells, sights, and lack of sounds.

I was in Moore oklahoma for the may 3rd f5. Saw things that I never thought were possible. A train engine twisted like a candy cane, and regular blades of grass stuck inside solid brick. Mind blowing.

I know several people who survived the Joplin tornado and their stories are CRAZY to hear, but one story from the folks I personally know always stands out to me. A gentleman and his wife who were in one of the hardest hit and worst areas in town had no basement, so they sheltered in their walk-in closet, mostly filled with his wife’s overly large clothing collection. As the tornado ripped their house apart, the sheer weight of the clothing on either side of them pulled the unsupported walls down into a tent over them, shielding them from the worst of it, even leaving them basically uninjured, and enabling their survival in a part of the city with one of the highest rates of fatalities and injuries. He decided to let her have as much clothing as she wants after that.

My friend, there is a tornado season. Look into the area you’re visiting and search for their tornado season. It’s uncommon for there to be many strong out of season tornadoes. You asked about tornados we’ve experienced so here’s my tornado-adjacent story: as a child I went camping with my father and some family friends on an island. It would just so happen that a storm came that afternoon. Unfortunately, we assumed that it wouldn’t be too big of a storm and decided to stay and ride out the storm. Remember here that I said island: we had to ride a boat to get there. About halfway through the storm, the winds picked up to the point where it was raining sideways. My dad and uncle were standing up keeping a tarp stretched out on the side of the awning to keep the rain off of the fire (and me). Of course being a weather-obsessed kid, I kept peeking my head around the side of it and getting pelted with rain that felt like daggers. Around this time, the storm got even worse and the adults actually had me sitting all huddled up with the women (not my dad because he was still keeping the fire dry). Despite their best efforts, I was able to watch as a waterspout formed in the river in front of us. I can still hear the sound of the water and the wind. All of our belongings were well secured long before this, and luckily it didn’t hit us directly. I think I’ll probably never stop keeping a very close watch on storms after seeing a waterspout 100 or so meters away from me. It’s both awe inspiring and completely bone-chilling.

Storm chasing is a real profession and the chasers are important in reporting and recording live immediate changes on scene when tornadoes occur. Tornadoes are more unpredictable than we often think, and they can make sudden sharp turns in unexpected directions or even turn around completely back the way they came from in seconds. Imagine a tornado passes over your house and you think its safe to come out, only to see it turn around for round 2. But the storm chasers also record the damage as the tornado moves and the wind speeds and other weather information, and they can be helpful with situations where the funnel is rain wrapped or has verticies and the sensors cannot accurately map them.

@6:19 you mentioned Euro homes you think would stand up. Well, here's the thing, It's not just the wind. Inside that wind, is the debris and materials the twister has picked up. So, imagine, a semi truck, a cow, group of cows, flying at your house at 150mph? ... It's not the wind, it's what's in the wind.

Tornadoes can absolutely destroy concrete and brick houses like in Europe ! No problem!

Joplins was huge, about a 1/3rd of the city was destroyed. It destroyed a Home Depot, Walmart, Dillons, restaurants, Walgreens, the hospital, highschool, multiple other schools, churches, and so many neighborhoods. When you went to see if, you had to use gps to get know where to were because you just couldn't get your bearings because everything you used to know where you were, was gone.

to put it in perspective, they said an F5 tornado has almost equal power to that of a Nuclear bomb. I've seen where one literally picked a train right up off the tracks and threw it. Speaking of trains it literally sounds like One when it's barreling towards you as well. One of the scariest things imaginable!

When I meet Europeans, they always say that you have a brick and motorhome that is solid construction, but throw a large tree at 100 miles an hour into it or a vehicle that will create a hole then 300 mph winds will obliterate it

Yes, that is all real footage of actual tornadoes. BTW, the movie "Twister" was released in 1996, not 1966.

You should watch a video on the rainsville alabama EF5, it totally destroyed brick and mortar homes, ripped asphalt off of roads, and dug a meter deep trench in the ground. Even threw a 200 kilogram safe across a field.

So when the weatherman was talking about getting underground, he was talking about the Tornado shelters. Homes in America that are located where tornadoes are common will usually have a tornado shelter that come with it. You usually have to go outside to get to the doors and get everyone underground.

The explosions you see are usually electric transformers or distribution stations getting destroyed, or occasionally you'll see explosions of gas pipes being ripped up when people's ovens are knocked over.

The idea behind chasing tornadoes in real time is to gather as much barometric data as possible in an attempt to be able to further predict when they will occur and give people more time to escape.

You'll notice a few states get tornadoes quite often. One you noted was Texas, there are two reasons for this. The first is Texas is in Tornado Alley. To the West are the Rocky mountains, so a lot of cold air is brought in from over there, but in the southeast is the Gulf of Mexico which often brings up a lot of warm moisture. These air masses bring about severe weather when they interact. That severe weather will then track east where you'll find other mini tornado alleys (deep south and the western parts of the rust belt). The Great Plains as a whole are very prone to tornadic weather including F5 tornadoes. As for Texas specifically, there's just a very high chance that if a tornado forms in the southern plains it will form in Texas. Texas is huge. Just to put it into perspective, the second largest country in Europe by landmass is Ukraine (largest country entirely in Europe if you want to qualify it that way instead). Ukraine is 603,628 km2. Texas is 695,662 km2. When you consider just how much area Texas takes up, odds are quite good that if a tornado touches down in the southern plains, it will be in Texas. If you account for landmass though, Oklahoma is actually far more likely to see these kinds of events than Texas is.

As an American that lived through the second one (quarter mile from scoured foundations) and two smaller tornadoes.... Never intentionally try to go sightsee tornadoes, they're terrifying.

Tornadoes can easily level brick homes as well as wooden ones. Underground IS safer, hence the existence of storm shelters in some areas. If you lack a basement or storm shelter to take cover in, any interior room away from windows is a recommended shelter. The more reinforced the building, the better, but SOME tornadoes, in the wrong place, can just be unsurvivable.

You do not have time to leave the area it is too dangerous to be in a vehicle if there is a major tornado. You go to the basement, storm shelter, or a room in the house that has no windows if you don’t have the 2 later. I lived through an F3. I was home with my 2 month old son. I took him, my 3dogs and myself into our laundry room with some candles and snacks to keep the puppies calm. The only thing you can do is wait and pray. The sound that you hear is amazing it sounded like 1,000 motorcycles were going past you at one time. You lose the electricity so you are in pitch black and the A/C is cut off without power. We were miserably hot since we were in a very small room. I was very afraid to open the door but had to just to get some fresh air and see to light the candles. The dogs kept crying and pawing it me. I think their heads must have been hurting just like mine. I was chewing gum to help and my son was taking a bottle to help him. I first thing I saw upon opening my front door was right into the primary bedroom of the home across the street from mine. You could see all the way through the house into their back yard. It was gut wrenching. Several of our neighbors garage doors (metal) were rolled up like a newspaper 🗞️ . Half the homes that had chimneys , they were lying in the backyard ripped off the back of the house. So grateful to be alive! And my son is now 21 years old we were lucky that day. We had angels 👼 watching over us.

Yes, I experienced an EF3 Tornado in North Carolina, USA. It destroyed 70+ homes out of 100 homes in a community DIRECTLY beside my apartment building and a few children died there. I was incredibly lucky/blessed that the tornado didn't continue it's path straight into my building and instead turned and went across the street, since I was stuck on the second floor and a direct hit would have been terrifying to go through on the second floor of a building. I tried to hide under a toilet in the bathroom with my pet bird.

My wife was in the #6 Xenia tornado. A passerby ran up to their door and warned them the tornado was coming. They all hid in their basement when the house took a direct hit and was totally destroyed over their heads. Her whole family survived, but her neighbor was killed. When they came upstairs after the tornado had passed, their home was gone except for the collapsed chimney and a huge pile of random rubble.

Man, I’ve lived in Joplin my entire life. That was the craziest day ever. Lost two friends. Abe Koury and Adam Darnabe! Rip

Storm chasers are a real thing. Some are scientists conducting research, others are new reporters, but many are thrill seekers. Yes, chasers have been killed chasing tornadoes.

I have been in two tornados and all I can say is they are the most mesmerizing beautiful events that leave your feeling so aware of how insignificant you are when mother nature flexes her true might....and the absolutely terrifying event to have to experience when the epiphany hits you that no matter how much control over your life you think you have...that all that control over your life doesn't amount to shit. In reality you have only the illusion of being in control. They are awe inspiring, the worst nightmare you wish was only a dream, and most humbling experience for any that are unlucky enough to cross paths with one.

As someone raised in Missouri, tornados are just an accepted risk but seeing thw destruction of of Joplin up close will never leave me. Blocks absolutely leveled...

Tim Samaras was a storm chaser whose main goal was to deploy probes into the paths of tornadoes. This measured wind speeds and scientific information. This information has been used to help warning systems and such. He was on the show Storm Chasers. He was known as one of the safest chasers out there. He along with his son and colleague were killed by a tornado while chasing. His loss was truly devastating. The researchers in this field have helped improve warning systems and tornado detection techniques, which have saved many lives.

While F5's are rare, tornadoes are very common here, especially in certain areas. For example, I had nine in my area last week, but they were all cataloged as being F0 or F1 -- baby tornadoes. You do have to be weather aware when visiting the US. And it doesn't matter if your home is brick or not. If a big enough tornado comes through, everything is getting wiped away. Doesn't matter what it's made out of. And I know this is a large generalization, but I've noticed that a lot of Europeans -- my friends included -- have a very hard time grasping just how large and destructive our tornadoes can be.

Storm chasers are extremely brave people and definitely needed. They are able to report to news channels where a tornado has been spotted and in what direction it’s going. A tornado hit our horse farm at night back in the 70’s no warnings or anything. When it was over all the horses that were in the pasture were in our front yard one of the barns had a momma and brand new baby in it. Thankfully my dad left the door to the pasture opened, the barn was completely destroyed but momma and baby were safe outside. The barn with 8 stalled horses in wasn’t even touched

Storm chasers who chase them are the voices that alert news stations about what’s going on and where they are currently. They also have technology to gather information for scientists to study and learn more about how they work. Possibly increasing the warning time up from 10 minutes to 30 or so. To give people more time to seek shelter and get their family, friends and pets to safely. It’s dangerous but a rewarding job. Plus they save lives along the way and take them to the hospital or search for survivors in the debris

A “tornado watch” indicates conditions are right for a tornado, a “warning” denotes a tornado has been sighted. The designation of a “tornado emergency” signifies a catastrophic tornado on the ground.

There have been babies ripped from their mothers' arms by tornadoes and the baby later found in a tree... still alive!!!

3 things: 1) thank you! Loved seeing this. 2) Swegle is awesome. Love his videos 3) nothing holds up to 300mph winds. Not brick, not concrete, not stone Thanks again!

I live 30 min to the north of Hackleburg/ Phil Campbell, Alabama. My cousin, who works for the Lauderdale County EMS (Emergency Medical Services) had to go to that area after the storms ripped through those towns. And his description of the area is extremely haunting. He told me that they would find body parts in trees, miles from the damage paths, etc. And when I say body parts, I mean torsos, heads, arms, legs, etc. I went down several weeks afterward to help with cleanup and helped to repair alot of houses and businesses. The damage was so immense that It nearly broke me down emotionally. It showed a massive building, what was a Wrangler blue jeans factory, which was destroyed. Steel "I" beams, the steel that is used for the skeletal framing, was twisted around trees and the trailers that semi trucks connect to, were mangled together with those I beams. You really don't have a clue when you see it on the news like I happened to see the storm. But to see the damage first hand is indescribable.

Bricks are irrelevant in a tornado. Schools and hospitals are usually brick and they come down under the winds of a tornado. Loaded trucks and trains are picked up and thrown by a strong tornado. I was in a tornado in Montgomery, Alabama in 1973, It picked up our roof and set it back down a bit crooked.

The best place to be is underground, because the main killer of tornadoes is debris. If you're underground, then stuff flying through the air picked up be wind can't hit you, even if your house above you gets picked up and blown away. Tornadoes don't kill by vacuuming up people (though they can), it's more like they turn an area in WWI No Man's Land, with machine guns shooting bullets (debris) everywhere. In that environment, a trench (basement or shelter) is the safest place to be. And it doesn't really matter that American homes are more often wood than brick or concrete. Your homes would be just as wrecked as ours. Better than the cheaply built homes where most tornadoes are deadly like trailer parks, sure, but well-built homes are just as safe as brick and concrete ones - and well-built homes being destroyed is the main criteria for something being EF4 or EF5. European homes just survive tornadoes because Europe doesn't really get strong tornadoes. It's a bit like saying "Why are you wearing Kevlar? You'd be much safer in our chainmail and plate armour!" to a guy about to get hit by an artillery barrage.

5:37 No. There are 3 types of tornado alerts: a tornado watch, a tornado warning, and a tornado emergency. A tornado watch means tornadoes are possible in the area and to "watch" for any that may form. A tornado warning means a tornado has been spotted or detected by weather radar and to take cover. A tornado emergency, which is a much newer and rarer alert, means a large, destructive tornado is causing significant damage and there is a high potential for loss of life.

Tornadoes are horrific and beautiful at the same time. I for one am grateful to the people who film them for us.

Andre "What is that?" That Andre is hell coming for breakfast. And it brought a voracious appetite.

A tornado can lift freight trains and semi-truck trailers into the air. So, they can easily pick up bricks, cement blocks, anything heavy. Tornadoes have shaved asphalt off roads! Only structures made of steel reinforced concrete have been known to survive. For example, I was living next to a large parking garage with 4 levels at one time and knew that was the place to go in a tornado.

I live in Texas and I'm a storm chaser, I chase tornadoes every spring. I'm actually going storm chasing later this week. It's a ton of fun and also very dangerous. In 2013 a 1 mile wide tornado was coming towards me and it almost killed me. I was chasing the storm at night, the tornado formed, I rushed to my friend's house in town, and the 1 mile wide tornado hit the house I took shelter in. You could hear the roaring sound and glass breaking all around us. after the tornado, we went outside and trees were thrown into every house except for my friend's house.

April 28 2024 Westmoreland Kansas was hit directly by a EF3 tornado, only 1 fatality and 3 injured, 22 houses gone and 5 business destroyed, all of my dad's side of my family saw it, and now I'm helping look through ruble and clean up

Storm Chasers usually aren’t trying to get content for videos. Most of the time they are amateur scientists and amateur meteorologists who have relationships with news stations and chase the storms to keep the news informed of what exactly the storm is doing from an on the ground point of view so the weatherman can relay that to people. They keep ppl informed of direction, damage, and whether it’s rain wrapped (where the rain hides the tornado so it can’t be seen). They’re crazy people but they’re genuinely good ppl who just want to help keep folks safe.

Underground is safest place during tornado. Basements are common in tornado alley.

The tornado at Jarrell, Tx took over 18" of top soil off the ground. It removed the hides from the cows. Identifying the fatalities to figure out who they were was a huge problem. I cannot even imagine how traumatized it's surviving victims, and for for the responders that helped after that monster finished it's rampage.

Greenfield, Iowa just got hit by an EF4/5 yesterday. This tornado season is wild.

You asked the question 'Have storm chasers died chasing storms?' 3 had died:Tim Samaras, Paul Samaras, and Carl Young. They had died in the 2013 El Reno F5 tornado. Tim had been a part of Discovery Channels's Storm Chasers show.

On May 11, 1982, I was in the military in Altus, Oklahoma, when four tornadoes hit the base. There was a lot of damage, but no fatalities. Before the tornadoes hit there was hail the size of golf balls and some the size of softballs. I saw one C-5 (the largest aircraft in the military) spun around like a top. The wing of that aircraft sliced through the nose cone of the C-5 next to it. My friend's car was at my house and the hail beat all of the chrome off of his car because it wasn't under cover. Another friend of mine heard the hail starting. He had just bought a new car. He lived in the barracks at the base. He ran out and moved his car across the street under the overhang at the closed gas station. It didn't get damaged from the hail, however, a tornado collapsed the gas station on top of his car and flattened it. There was a group of guys under a pool table on the third floor of the barracks when the tornado hit. When it had passed they and the pool table was the only thing left in the room on the third floor. I saw cars flipped over on top of each other and ended up having to help clean up all of the damage around the barracks. It was absolutely amazing. The winds were so strong it could pick up a piece of straw and stick it like a knife into a telephone pole. I will never forget that day. I don't think I spent one year of the 13 years I lived in Oklahoma without hearing about tornadoes all around us.

5:30 a tornado watch is when the conditions to make a tornado are there. A tornado warning is acknowledging that there is circulation on the ground. A tornado emergency means that there is not just circulation on the ground, but that it is causing massive damage and that it is dangerous to be above ground even in a well-built structure. It really irritates me that they didn't mention the reason this tornado was considered so significant when tornadoes that do this much damage sweep through the Moore/OKC Metro about once a decade. The reason that this one had so much media coverage was because the tornado hit the Moore elementary school and those children were trapped, some of them for days. The last seven to be recovered had been moved to a basement-like closet when their teachers realized that it was too dangerous for them to be in their evacuation zone. A water pipe burst, those children were trapped, and all seven of them drowned. Their deaths pushed for legislation to be put in place in Oklahoma to require all schools to have evacuation shelters that could sustain the type of damage that those children should have been protected from. Antonia Candelaria, Janae Hornsby, Sydney Angle, Emily Conatzer, Nicolas McCabe and Christopher Legg would have graduated high school last year.

Couple things..1.. your English is great. 2. I grew up here and have been through dozens of tornadoes. An EF0 hit my house a few years back and removed my above ground pool. No other damage. The sound is deafening. Great video. Keep it up

My husband is from Oklahoma. There it is mandatory that any house built after a certain year has to also include an underground shelter for tornados. They also have tracking devices so they can be discovered if the underground shelters aren't in their original locations..

My daughter, 10 has been obsessed with tornados since she was a toddler and has always wanted us to have one. Well, a month ago she got her wish. It wasn't expected at the time, not even showing rain so while she was taking a bath it started raining, the wind started whipping, and sirens started blaring! I snatched a towel and snatched her from the shower, telling her there's a tornado, follow daddy to the basement. She now says she still likes tornados but not touching down. It destroyed the neighborhood down the street before ripping across the Ohio river into KY. Yes they can rip brick homes apart. Some of the homes hit were wood, some brick, others thick grey stones. (Forget the name of that stone) They weren't as bad as the wood but still had walls ripped from the foundation and missing roofs. And this was just an EF1 level tornado.

I was in the Rolling Fork EF-4 tornado with 195 mph winds (314 kmh)

There are people with custom armored vehicles meant to go inside tornados, so yes people do go try to “catch” tornados.

A tornado warning means that one has been spotted and is actually on the ground. A tornado emergency means get ready to meet your maker because all hell is about to break loose.

I have friends all over Europe and we've talked about these because I live in a place they can and do show up. This is something that's pretty incomprehensible if you haven't experienced this phenomena of tornados. Although this is about f5's, if an F3 is coming, kiss your ass goodbye, I've seen it. Bout 12 years ago came within a few miles of us. The sound is what you remember most. It came at evening as the sun was setting, the skies became black and nothing but a deafening roar. As I watched from my porch, listening to the scanner because people are tracking them, a feeling comes over you when you realize, there is nothing, not one thing you can do about it if it's coming at you. All you can do is hide. This is why everyone, mostly, has a basement in their house and a lot of times, a place fixed up extra strong just in case. If you need it, it's only once, but an important one time use. Cause, most likely, you'll be looking at sky with a direct hit after it passes, or, and this is the nutty thing about twisters, I've seen it take out a row of houses, but leave one or more in the middle almost untouched. When you see the aftermath, the path it takes....pictures don't enough. But hopefully, that's all you ever get to see. It aint pretty, it hurts your heart. I saw it go through a forest of pines, 50-75' high. It looked like a giant walked through there with a weed eater and flattened the place a quarter mile wide. It was cleaned out and replanted, still nowhere close to what it once was. It also took down a new school, brick walls, caved in. ~ Yah man, everyone has their own disasters of some kind, that's one I have to deal with. But the tradeoff? wouldn't trade still.

There was a tornado that hit just 1 mile from my home last summer. It was only classified as an EF1, but it still caused damage to several homes in the area. The tornado sirens went off after the tornado had already passed meaning that if it were stronger, there could have been several injuries. Thankfully no one was hurt or killed, but some of the buildings still have not been repaired. It is extremely rare for my portion of my state to see tornadoes. So the fact that an EF1 hit just 1 mile from my home is still quite shocking It took electrical crews and road crews several days to open the roads up and get power back to the local homes. Entire trees blocked several roads and brand new electrical lines had to be installed. It was part of a 5 tornado outbreak across my state of which the most powerful was an EF2. Again, tornadoes in my state are quite rare

Real Time EF-5 Joplin, Missouri is terrifying; lots of actual footage from residents and news media. Personal testimonies are heartbreaking.

Ef5 tornadoes clear the ground and nothing is left aboveground. 😮😮😮

Bricks are still are destroyed with severe tornados. The stone houses survived Joplins, however their roofs didn't.

I've had a tornado go directly over my house before. My house has concrete walls so its pretty sturdy, but I was still praying for my survival. I will never forget the sound of a heavy train barreling toward the house, and looking out the windows as it passed by. It looked like there was a river, a rush of white water, just outside. House was fine except the roof and one window, but everything around the house had been severely damaged. Barn tin lodged inside of wood, wooden boards sticking out of the dirt everywhere, trees uprooted, buildings demolished. Makes me really appreciate the place I call home.

27:44 there are a few big reasons for storm chasing. while many do it for the thrill, some people also stream to weather stations and are basically stations' "eyes on the ground", while yet others chase storms to conduct research!

An EF5 that was not on this list was the 2013 El Reno tornado. Four storm chasers lost their lives following this event.

Doesn’t matter what you build with. When it comes to EF5 tornados, they will rip through literally anything and everything.

If you want some tips to avoid tornados in America, here's some advice: 1. Tornadoes mostly happen from April-June, since they have favorable weather conditions 2. Stay out of tornado alley, which is a stretch of land from Nebraska down south to Texas. Thats where most tornadoes happen, along with Mississippi and Alabama. 3. Don't go anywhere near Oklahoma

The jarrell F5 pulverized brick and concrete to dust. There was a fine layer of wet, powdered brick across much of the region that day. If you want some insane tornado damage footage, look up the Mayfield Kentucky ef4 from 2021. It hit the Downton area of Mayfield and leveled half the city. Street view of downtown Mayfield Kentucky is incredible. It's empty lot after empty lot where a brick courthouse and busy district once stood.

I am from the Southern Tornado Alley where the 1st storm outbreak hit. I lost 4 friends in that one. I have seen dozens of tornadoes in real life, a couple of really really bad ones. I have watched roofs ripped off, trees sucked out of the ground, boathouses, garages, and sheds collapsed and I've also seen sheds picked up whole and carried off. Bricks don't stop EF-5 tornadoes, lol. They become deadly missiles. We still build many houses with brick, if people want them. We build with wood because it is cheaper and more sustainable. America is COVERED in trees, especially in the East.

13:55 We had experienced three tornadoes hitting relatively the same area, two of them were rated EF3, and the other was rated EF2. The EF2 struck about 1000 feet north of our house, ripping a tree out of the ground from a house over half a mile away and tossing it onto our property. One of the EF3s hit a small airport, and I forgot where the other EF3 struck. I don't remember how many fatalities there were total, but I'd guess less than 20 because it occurred in a somewhat rural area with tons of farm land. (It all happened on the same day too)

Yep, storm shelters underground are truly the best protection from tornadoes. Being in a small bunker away from flying trees and cars when the wind is going 200+ miles per hour can definitely save you from dying in a house that is being sandblasted with lethal debris. And while tornadoes may seem crazy, it's not like they happen all the time, but the geography of the middle of the US is favorable to creating them compared to other regions of the nation and world.

André notice that 1950s Waco tornado? All those buildings were BRICK!! The downtown Fort Worth tornado, that building was steel!!! Yes, the building was wiped off the face of the earth, but it was damaged so badly they almost decided to demolish it. Remember... it was "only" and f-3!!!

Answering a few questions... Joplin is so famous is because it hit the hospital. E:very town I've lived in has been hit, but by 0-2. My house hasn't"t ever. There was a 4 not far away. I voluteered for cleanup. Chasers are scientists, police ground spotting and warning, and crazy Americans.

I know this is from a month ago, but maybe I'll be adding something valuable. • So, America has something called "tornado alley" - a place where tornadoes are common because of the mixing of cold dry arctic air and warm wet equatorial air. While basically any place on earth can experience a tornado, they are much more common in places where the large air masses can mix freely, and America has a vast plain where that's easy to do. • On the subject of the "debris ball" - that means that radar is picking up the sheer amount of stuff that the tornado is vortexing up and throwing into the atmosphere. If radar is picking up debris, that means a tornado is definitely touching town, and a large debris ball means a large, strong tornado. • Well-built homes include a criteria where the walls are supposed to be bolted to the foundations, and roofs bolted to the walls. When they were talking about civil engineering to defend against severe weather, they mean, among other things, ways to help keep homes from collapsing. Many lesser tornadoes are survivable by going below ground or sheltering in the center of the home, usually in bathrooms or in closets, staying away from windows and covering yourself against flying debris. (Your video wasn't quite over yet and I see that they covered this at the end.) EF5's are capable of sweeping well-built homes from their foundations, which means that being underground is the only possible, not certain, way to survive a direct hit. • During the El Reno Ef3, which I believe currently holds the record for the largest/widest tornado ever recorded, four storm chasers were killed while attempting to escape from it when the tornado expanded in width and increased in velocity. Three of them, in one car, were well-known. Tim Samaris, his son, and Carl Young were killed when their car was overtaken by the tornado. It was terribly tragic, simply from the standpoint that Tim Samaris was a big proponent of safe storm chasing, and many in the greater storm chasing community are trying to learn to keep themselves safer during chases in their memory; a reevaluation of what many chasers have historically considered to be "safe" came under scrutiny. • The vortex you can see isn't the only danger. In addition to wind blown debris, and enormous hail (occasionally mind-blowingly large), additional vortexes may form from the same parent storm, the most common being anti-cyclonic tornadoes that spin the opposite way. There are famous, well-documented examples of two strong tornadoes on the ground in the same place at the same time. • I highly recommend the National Geographic documentary "Inside the Mega Twister" for a detailed look at the El Reno EF3. While you wouldn't think an EF3 to be anywhere near the awe-inspiring EF5's, the El Reno monster is definitely a contender. There are recordings of the multiple vortices inside the greater circulation of that tornado that are just wild to see. Multiple is just that - multiple. They are incredible violent, and very destructive. • While others in the comments have addressed the Watch/Warning/Emergency differences (Conditions favorable / One or more on the ground / Big one headed your way), it is also important to know that leaving the area isn't necessarily a good idea. The only reason you should be leaving is because you KNOW your home will not survive a hit (mobile home / trailer) and you should be headed to a pre-designated shelter, even if that's just a neighbor with a basement. You put a thousand cars on the road fleeing an area, and what you get is a major traffic jam with a tornado emergency headed your way and nobody is going anywhere. Bad, bad situation. • Yeah, it's usually a bad idea to be standing outside recording a tornado, but that being said, if the tornado is tracking left to right or right to left as you watch it, and you're under some cover, you're PROBABLY perfectly okay... but hail, additional vortexes, debris, and a sudden change in direction and velocity are all possibilities to keep an eye out for. • Unless you live in tornado alley, the likelihood of being impacted by a tornado is incredibly low. Most people don't have to worry that they'll ever even lay eyes on one for themselves. But when the sirens go off, you get down and shelter. Your home is guaranteed to be damaged by hail and straight-line winds before a tornado, so it's not something to dwell on. I hope I've been helpful. Have a great day! ^_^

Even now there's whole fields in Joplin where there used to be buildings and trees. My aunt's car ended up in a tree several blocks away.

I live in eastern Oklahoma and I can tell you that the tornado that hit Moore Ok was so strong it sucked up the pavement!!!! It also dug a trench in the earth where there was no structures. The destruction was unbelievable

The night of December 10-11, 2021 will be burned my mind forever. My town took a direct hit and I will never forget the fear I felt and the damage I saw in the morning.

The Joplin Missouri tornado made the city of Joplin look like the aftermath of a nuclear war!!

I was just soyluth of the Moore F5, just north of the Joplin F5 and passed just ahead of the Tuscaloosa F4. As a truck driver I'm frequently in areas of bad weather.

The EF4 that went through Tuscaloosa mentioned at 4:11 in this video nearly hit my grandmothers house. She had a tree thrown through her dining room wall and if you went 1 street over from where her house was there were no houses left on that street. My dad and I had to clear multiple trees from the road just to get to her house to check on her. She was personally unharmed by it.

Tornado Watch means conditions are right for a tornado Tornado Warning means a tornado has been spotted either by radar or by storm chasers. Tornado Emergency means catastrophic damage is immenant.

I believe the biggest thing with tornadoes is that the wind is what shreds buildings up. The debris they pick up and throw around can go through your house, make a hole in a wall or window and let all that strong wind in and cycle around inside and take the house apart. But an EF5 is so strong that I don't thing making your house out of brick will help that much.

I live in joplin, mo. I did lose my home and belongings from that tornado. I will always remember that day

To answer your question about chasers, it is to obtain footage and information so that we can better understand them and then better prepare for them.