2008-02-05 DISC: TX / AR / MO / IL / KY / TN / MS

[Sam Sagnella]

PEORIA, Ill. (AP) - Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE:CAT) said Tuesday it expects assembly operations for a wide range of its machinery to be sporadically affected over the next few months due to tornado damage at a Mississippi plant.

-->Caterpillar sees disruptions on tornado

 

[Alexandre Aguiar]

I do not know if someone already posted, but TRMM website has nice imagery of the Super Tuesday Outbreak.

http://trmm.gsfc.nasa.gov/

 

[Chris Hayes]

Anyone know the confirmed number of tornados from the Super Tuesday Outbreak. Wikipedia says 73 confirmed. Dont know how true that is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_2008_tornado_outbreak

 

[rdale]

It takes 6-9 months usually for a final confirmed tally.

 

[Brian Stertz]

The May 3rd tornado did cycle a bit once it crossed I-44 on the north side of Newcastle as it moved towards the river. While it morphed into a stovepipe and then a multiple vortex structure....it never seemed to weaken below F2/F3 strength as long as I watched it.

 

[John Peters]

NWS Little Rock has posted a GIS file with more detailed info on the 123 mile track. Looks like there were two segments of EF-4 damage: One near Clinton and one further northeast near Zion.

Here is the link: http://www.srh.noaa.gov/lzk/html/svr0208a.htm

 

[Danny Neal]

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/ohx/surveys/images/020508/ss080205_why_not_nashville.php

An interesting read to say the least.

 

[Heidi Farrar]

Just when you thought it couldn't get any more mind-boggling than the dental X-rays I found that originated in Clinton, AR ... This afternoon I found this:

I need to take a macro photo of the critical lines so any disbelievers will be satisfied, but, you need to know that David's Garage & Wrecker Service is located in ATKINS, AR!!! If my measurements are correct, Atkins is 91 miles from where I found this on our neighbors' property. It was dropped in a grove of cedars just off of a perimeter road, near a field edge. I have been meaning to scour the field edges on their property (I have found almost every item of paper on field edges so far) for over a week now. It's hard to tell what else I haven't found yet, but realisticaly, I never expected to find something from this far away. When I first started looking around at all, I thought something identifiable from Mountain View would be pretty amazing (that's closer to me than Clinton). I'm pretty sure I'm finding stuff from their hospital, which was badly damaged, but so far I can't nail that down because nothing I've found has anything like a name or address on it.

Regardless, my husband and I had a very difficult time wrapping our brains around the concept that this piece of paper made such a journey across the Ozarks and just happened to land, in relatively pristine condition, right here! In fact, this piece is actually in better condition than the other items I have found! As I said: It's mind boggling!

 

[Dennis Sherrod]

Heidi,
Your finding this debris reminds me of the April 1998 tornado that hit parts of Jefferson County, Alabama, and touched down a couple more times all the way into Georgia. From what I remember, it was an F5 that caused numerous deaths and injuries. The one point it devastated in western Jefferson County was called Oak Grove. My Mom lives approximately 32 miles in an easterly direction, as the crow flies, from this area. I remember finding numerous pictures, papers, pieces of cloth, insulation, and clothing all along a path of approximately 1/2 mile around her house. I was able to drive some streets and follow the approximate path it took overhead by the debris found in yards, trees, and on the street. There were news reports of debris (supposedly verified) of some papers and debris found in western Georgia where it again touched down that came from Oak Grove. This was over 80 - 100 miles away. I remember hearing some of these reports and seeing them on TV and they are very similar to your findings and match what I also found.

 

[Gerard Jebaily]

An amazing find Heidi. Ive heard of items being found tens of miles from their origination but that is quite a distance. Have you tried to contact the owner of the shop to make sure that the document wasnt displaced by a truck doing a mobile call in the area at the time of the outbreak? Just a thought to wonder if even some of that incredible distance was made by more than wind. Nevertheless, im still calling this the SuperCELL Tuesday outbreak that will be in the history books.

 

[Greg Stumpf]

There is an excellent online resource for a tornado debris project that took place at OU several years ago:

http://www.gcn.ou.edu/~jsnow/Research/Debris/

Although the project is no longer active, there are some links to some excellent papers about the subject.

 

[Heidi Farrar]

Have you tried to contact the owner of the shop to make sure that the document wasnt displaced by a truck doing a mobile call in the area at the time of the outbreak?

...

If I'm correctly understanding what you mean here (I hope I am ), there are several details I can add to kind of wipe out the chance of that happening, the first of which being that I'm pretty sure that there is a 0% chance that a tow-truck from this shop in Atkins was anywhere near Izard Co. that day. The main thing, though, is that the date on the slip reads July 30, 2002. With that knowledge, I have to believe this came from a filing cabinet. All of the dated material I've found, from magazine pages to this repair order slip, is pretty old -- that is to say not current.

My intentions are to contact the shop (and the dentist's office) at some point. I am a little sensitive about doing that right now, though, because I feel like it's still too soon. On that note, my neighbor had some business in the Clinton area yesterday, and while he was there he toured the damage in town. Before he got there I told him about the X-rays, and it turns out he had actually visited that specific dentist a few years back, so he knew excatly where the office was. I spoke to my neighbor again yesterday after he got back, and he told me there is nothing left of the place. So ... I'm thinking that right now they would probably not be too charmed to learn that someone's X-rays from their office, or in the case of the Atkins debris, a repair order from their shop, landed all the way up here. But I may be wrong ... it might be an amazing curiosity for them.

- Thanks for the link to the debris project, Greg.

 

[Danny Neal]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx_nSAB6LWE&feature=related - more video of the large AR tornado, near Cleveland.

 

[Danny Neal]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlBubTVUZvA&feature=related - first hand account of tornado at Union University.

 

[Dann Cianca]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlBubTVUZvA&feature=related - first hand account of tornado at Union University.

Wow, even though you can't see much ... that's a great video. Thanks for sharing man.

 

[Matthew K. Hartman]

radar loops

Hello folks,

I apologize it has taken a while, but if anyone is interested, I've compiled radar loops from both Paducah (PAH) and Louisville (LVX), KY and have placed them in my archives.

I also have a rather extensive mosaic loop from the Southeast US that ranges from around 21z on the 5th through 06z on the 6th that provides a nice overview of the event.

Loops vary in length, but broadband connections will handle these best. Over 70 images are required to load for the local radar loops and over 100 images for the mosaic loop, so be patient.

Links to the overall archive (I have a few other radar grabs and one VIS loop here) and the radar loops, themselves can be found in my Event List, found here:

http://www.mhartman-wx.com/mwx_eventList.html

 

[Charles Loring]

I know I'm digging up an old thread, but I wanted to show this picture of the Columbia Gulf fire (that shot up 400 feet and was seen over 100 miles away). I live about 5 miles from Columbia Gulf and you could actually hear the roar of the fire if you stayed quiet long enough. The flames were ablaze for over two hours. The flames were so bright it was like a continuous sun rise. I don't believe the national media ever published a photo of the blaze and I just wanted everyone to see it.

Here in Lafayette you can still see the tornado's path in spots, especially the tree line damage. It will be a night I will never forget...

The photo is blurry for a number of reasons, so I do apologize for that.

 

[Jonathan Beeson]

Yesterday marked the 10 year anniversary of the Super Tuesday outbreak. It produced a very impressive 5 EF-4 tornadoes, including the extremely long tracked Arkansas tornado which may have had a legitimate argument for EF-5 status, depending on who you talk to. A surprising significance of this outbreak is this is where the Tornado Debris Signature was first discovered, coming on an EF-4 in North Alabama that was in the vicinity of an experimental Dual Pol radar.

This specific EF-4 has been a very interesting topic of mine over the years, as it occurred at about 3:30 AM local time and had approximately 250 J/KG of SBCAPE to work with. The North Alabama activity is often overlooked in lieu of the more widespread activity further north and west earlier in the evening, but the environment over North Alabama that night is one of the most fascinating tornadic environments of the modern era IMHO.