Tornado Safety - Cars vs. Ditches Controversy

[Rob Wadsworth]

Saw a small car in Quinter KS/2008 that had been picked up by a EF4; the inside of all the windows were painted in blood. ANY car that gets tossed 50-100ft and rolls from all that inertia is going to become a Toyota burrito. Hope I never have to see that again; but that is probably not the case.

I'd agree that a ditch isn't much safer. However, since the air is moving across the ground surface, it would still be more safe than taking a tornado ride in a car. A car is also more easily struck by debris than someone in a ditch from this debris moving across the surface as well. I'd also freely admit that we are splitting some pretty fine hairs in this discussion too. Which is safer? Either one can kill. Depends ultimately if it was your day to die - or not. Not exactly scientific; but true nonetheless.

 

[Warren Faidley]

One note: Many of the tornado vs. automobile accidents I've come across were situations where the vehicles were traveling at high speeds, not stationary. This was because the driver was unaware of a tornado and simply drove into it, or the driver was traveling at high speeds to try and outrun the tornado. I think in many of these situations, where drivers lost control at high speeds due to erratic winds, the occupant(s) suffered greater injuries or death because the vehicle had increased potential energy, as opposed to a stationary vehicle. In such cases you have to wonder if the stationary vehicle would suffer less damage? I also question the logic of people driving away from a potential tornado strike. Not only because of crowded roads, but can you imagine hundreds of vehicles traveling in panic mode from a city? I actually saw accident scenes away from the tornadoes in Moore, OK and El Reno, where people were obviously fleeing in panic. And, how many of these television evacuation encouragements will turn out to be false alarms, where people are killed fleeing for nothing? We all know how many of these events go bust before the tornado reaches the city. I'm still thinking about all this, but I'm not sure this was well thought out before it was officially adopted.

W.

 

[Rob H]

For reference, the individual critically injured from the Wayne tornado tried sheltering in a ditch when a garbage dumpster was thrown on top of him. It's kind of a blur, but I think the truck they were in was fine.

edit: this also happened very close to the EF-4 damage, so it wasn't "mildly" tornadic

 

[Mike Johnston]

I don't know that these "new rules" necessarily create a controversy. The car vs. ditch was a devil's choice before and still is. It was generally known, and still is, that a sturdy structure is the preferable place to shelter. I doubt anything will all of a sudden cause people to get into their car with a tornado bearing down. If they are already in their car, the old rule of thumb to drive at a right angle to the path of the tornado is pretty much as valid as it always has been.

 

[Greg Ansel]

After watching an episode of "Tornado Road", I noticed a few of the characters on the show not wearing seatbelts. I would like to know if there is a study on how many of these people who are sucked out of vehicles are wearing seatbelts. I would think most are not as it the winds would have to be strong enough to rip the person apart or rip the seatbelts apart. The other factor is that there is internal debris (Laptops, luggage, cameras, etc.) that will make the inside of the vehicle a nice martini shaker when rolled.

 

[rdale]

I would like to know if there is a study on how many of these people who are sucked out of vehicles are wearing seatbelts.

Winds don't "suck" people out of anything, let alone a car...

I would think most are not as it the winds would have to be strong enough to rip the person apart or rip the seatbelts apart.

I'm quite certain wind cannot "rip" a seatbelt either

There should be no controversy. Look at all the public deaths in the May 31 OKC tornado... Everyone that died was in a car and left that for a ditch, to be killed by the flash flood instead as their car survived the rain just fine.

 

[Rob H]

To continue my series of "bad ideas and incorrect assumptions easily visualized" here is what probably does not happen with wind flowing over a ditch:

 

[Mike Marz]

I was at Wayne minutes after the tornado came through and while looking for people in the ditches I came upon this red truck, (images below). Not sure if this was that guys truck or not, but aside from all the windowns being blown out and some exterior dents, it seemed OK... This was right next to the industrial part of town where large tractors were mangled. If you are interested in the entire video https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=At_arjaxY5U... I think if I were ever to NEED to take this kind of action, I would drive my vehicle into the ditch or lowest area, and then get as low as possible in the vehicle. Like people have said though, with upper end tornadoes it likely won't matter.

 

[Rob Wadsworth]

Don't think anyone said that the ditch has calm air; it just doesn't allow for winds to hurl debris directly at a person. If anything that air should be quite turbulent. Indirect debris in the ditch is another matter. Liked the cartoon - though.

I think the seat belt laws have created compliance to a large degree. if someone had been found ejected it was probably due to the tremendous force of the vehicle chassis being bent and torn and losing integrity of the seat belt connection points with the chassis. Motors are often found far from the vehicle, as being torn out by these same forces. They have stronger ties to the chassis than seat belts do - of course.

Panic - going back to Warren's last point - is a killer all on its own. But decisions made in real time with little warning and lack of options compound the death rate. Panic adds confusion unless people are trained in these situations. El Reno proved it once again.

 

[Rob H]

I was at Wayne minutes after the tornado came through and while looking for people in the ditches I came upon this red truck, (images below). Not sure if this was that guys truck or not, but aside from all the windowns being blown out and some exterior dents, it seemed OK...

Yep, pretty sure that was their vehicle. Now I have no idea where they left it, and how far it moved, but it looks reasonably unscathed for going through an EF-4.

Don't think anyone said that the ditch has calm air; it just doesn't allow for winds to hurl debris directly at a person. If anything the should be quite turbulent. Indirect debris in the ditch is another matter. Liked the cartoon - though.

Yeah, I'd take ditch over no ditch. The image was very tongue-in-cheek but my point is that there would be some sort of divergence which would likely render any lessening of the blender effect negligible.

With the Wayne example, the two men left the truck to seek shelter in the ditch. The tornado threw a dumpster and the impact broke bones and sliced an artery. I don't know if that's direct or indirect, but either way its enough to kill someone. The other person in the truck just had a pretty good laceration on his hand. What does this anecdotal evidence prove? I'm not sure! The dumpster could have easily been thrown into the truck and crushed both of them. The thing the Wayne ditch had going for it was that it was huge, and possibly 20 ft. deep, so the chance of drowning might have been smaller.

 

[Mike Marz]

Scary, I watched my video back and I can see the dumpster you are talking about, and in front of it there are people tending to a person on the ground. The more I think about that tornado the luckier I feel we were. Once we heard reports of the wedge in progress we were tempted to fly east and hook slice on that very road but I wasn't confident we would beat the tornado so we hung back. Now, I'm pretty sure we could have got blown down into that ditch also had we tried that. Rain wrapped wedges are scarrrrryyy if you get caught on the wrong side.

 

[John Farley]

One note: Many of the tornado vs. automobile accidents I've come across were situations where the vehicles were traveling at high speeds, not stationary. This was because the driver was unaware of a tornado and simply drove into it, or the driver was traveling at high speeds to try and outrun the tornado. I think in many of these situations, where drivers lost control at high speeds due to erratic winds, the occupant(s) suffered greater injuries or death because the vehicle had increased potential energy, as opposed to a stationary vehicle. In such cases you have to wonder if the stationary vehicle would suffer less damage? I also question the logic of people driving away from a potential tornado strike. Not only because of crowded roads, but can you imagine hundreds of vehicles traveling in panic mode from a city? I actually saw accident scenes away from the tornadoes in Moore, OK and El Reno, where people were obviously fleeing in panic. And, how many of these television evacuation encouragements will turn out to be false alarms, where people are killed fleeing for nothing? We all know how many of these events go bust before the tornado reaches the city. I'm still thinking about all this, but I'm not sure this was well thought out before it was officially adopted.

W.

Just to be clear, in my post suggesting driving out of the path if you can see the tornado and can tell what way it is moving, I was NOT talking about driving away from your home or other shelter or evacuating cities. I was talking about a situation in which you are driving and encounter a tornado. It is NEVER a good idea to try to evacuate a city for a tornado, and the only situation in which I would leave home and drive out of the path of a tornado would be in wide open country with a strong tornado moving straight toward your house and a you have a clear escape path. Even then, you might be better in the basement if you have one. So, again to be clear, I totally agree with Warren that evacuating urban areas in tornado warnings should NEVER be advised, and anyone who gives such a message on TV or radio is endangering people's lives.

 

[TJKLECKNER]

Yeah, most of the ditches around here won't do alot of good.

Plus everything is under a foot of water due to flooding. I really can't see either being a great option, but I would personally stay in the car and hope it doesn't completely crumple as I get tossed like a toy.

If all else fails, remain in the the car, but put the car in the ditch:

 

[Dan Robinson]

Not all ditches are created equal - I'd say the deep and narrow one in TJ's second image would probably be a great shelter, providing a car isn't going to roll on top of you like that.

 

[Jake Orosi]

Sadly, most ditches I've seen are nothing like that; they're usually very shallow (1 - 2'), more like gentle linear depressions than carved-out channels. I don't think there would be anything especially safer about such a location than in a vehicle.

I agree with John Farley's post above; I wouldn't evacuate my house or some similar shelter in a vehicle to escape from a tornado; but if I'm already in my vehicle, and I see a tornado up ahead, I'm not going to park and go wait in a ditch; I'm going to turn around and drive away. You don't need to drive like a maniac or go particularly far to evade a tornado, except in the highly-statistically-unlikely case that the tornado's path happens to coincide exactly with the road you're escaping on.

In order to feel like it would be safer to abandon a perfectly good vehicle and dive into a ditch, it would have to be a scenario like driving along completely oblivious, and suddenly looking in the rearview and seeing a tornado unexpectedly riding my bumper like a road-rager. And even then I'd probably hesitate, because it seems to me that in the moments between your exiting the vehicle and entering the ditch, you're more vulnerable by several orders of magnitude than you would be in either the vehicle or the ditch.