How many tornadoes were there actually during the Dodge City-outbreak?

[ChristofferB]

I am not extremely interested in my tornado count but I do keep track of it, for fun. During the Dodge City tornado outbreak I was too busy photographing and enjoying the scenery that I completely lost track of the number of tornadoes we saw.

Have you/anyone documented the amount of tornadoes during that day? Preferably with photos so I can compare to what we saw (reference to your blog post perhaps?). A reference to a complete video of the day would be helpful as well.

 

[Jeff Duda]

NCDC's Storm Events Database (https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/stormevents/) lists 38 "events" on 24 May 2016 between midnight and midnight local time within the state of Kansas. Not all events represent separate tornadoes, however, as segments crossing county lines and CWA boundaries are usually counted as separate events. So you will need to go through the list and stitch together segments based on the narratives and start/end points to determine the true tornado count.

Storm Events is regarded as the official record in the US, so whatever you come up with would be an official count.

 

[Jeff Duda]

You can also just use the event report page from the Dodge City office, since I'm assuming you aren't interested in the tornadoes that occurred further to the northwest.

https://www.weather.gov/ddc/24may2016SevereWx

 

[GPhillips]

I am not extremely interested in my tornado count but I do keep track of it, for fun. During the Dodge City tornado outbreak I was too busy photographing and enjoying the scenery that I completely lost track of the number of tornadoes we saw.

Have you/anyone documented the amount of tornadoes during that day? Preferably with photos so I can compare to what we saw (reference to your blog post perhaps?). A reference to a complete video of the day would be helpful as well.

You can also go to the reports map that can be generated from the official archives at SPC. For example here. It allows you to zoom in and pan with counties overlaid. It might give you a better geographic picture and keeps the tornadoes that cross county lines as 1 event.
http://www.spc.noaa.gov/climo/onlin...9999&showt=0&legend=1&showh=0&showw=0&cntys=1

 

[ChristofferB]

Great! I will look into those sources! Thanks

 

[JamesCaruso]

Here’s a blog post from John Davies on this topic:

http://davieswx.blogspot.com/2016/05/counting-tornadoes-dodge-city-24-may.html?m=1



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Jeff House]

I agree with the Davies regarding count. Usually I go by supercell cycles to measure the length of the show. If a cycle had more than one tornado, great! A couple cycles on the DDC day had multiple tornadoes, boosting the total tornado count.

I loved DDC because it had both cycles and multiples, but it is rare. Between one cycle with 3 tornadoes, and 3 cycles with single tornadoes, I'll take the latter because the total show lasts longer. Assumes all else equal (visibility, classic sup, roads, etc.)