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Posted: 4/29/2011 5:39:55 PM EDT
[#1]
Quoted:
Quoted:
It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does. 
An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys.
It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 5:56:56 PM EDT
[#2]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does.
An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys.
It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I found this after I asked that question. http://www.nhma.info/ Check out the pic and caption. Im like you, I would rather be underground, but we have a saferoom so Im hoping it will be suffient. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 5:57:17 PM EDT
[#3]
FWIW
MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". 
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Posted: 4/29/2011 5:58:24 PM EDT
[#4]
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Me? I prefer storm shelters. seriously. How hard is it to spend a weekend digging a 6x6x6 hole in your back yard . Then take another weekend building a roof over it witha trap door staked into the ground around it. probably wouldn't cost more than 100 dollars in materials. If you wanted to you could easily take a third weekend and just poor some cheap concrete walls and a floor for it as well. Your odds are pretty good in some areas of getting hit by a tornado and it doesn't take much to protect yourself. really, really bad idea. hey, on the bright so, people won't have to worry about burying you because you'd have done it yourself. unbraced excavations over 3' deep are nothing to fool around with, either. if you're going to dig the hole, buy a pre fab shelter to go in it. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:00:34 PM EDT
[#5]
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Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. Wednesday, it would have been suicidal for us to have left and tried to outran the storms, unless we had left the night before. Three hours either direction from us was still dangerous. Fortunately, only one of the storms passed over us here....and it passed OVER us. Im not trying to be argumentative. But, with a little experience you too can do as I do.You dont outrun the storms, although I do it all the time, You drop south 1/4 mile - 1 mile and you're out of the path. Sit back and watch with a video cam, throw out the lawn chairs and sip on a beer or something. That all takes some experience I suppose and I take for granted as it seems easy for me, but some people cant grasp that concept. That would have been exceedingly difficult in Southeast TN Wednesday night. We literally had a new tornado warning issued every 15 minutes for a 3.5 hour period. Looking on the radar map, they were everywhere. North, South, East and West. I also imagine it is easier to navigate away from a tornado in the Midwest due to terrain differences. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:05:57 PM EDT
[#6]
Quoted:
FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out.
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:08:41 PM EDT
[#7]
Another thing you might consider is strapping yourself to the toilet.
I don't think it would provide any protection but it would be funny to see someone flying around like that. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:10:34 PM EDT
[#8]
Quoted:
Quoted:
FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out. it is important to point out that the pressure exerted by the wind increases by the square of the velocity, too. a tornado with twice the wind speed of a hurricane is actually 4 times as strong. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:13:06 PM EDT
[#9]
Bath tubs are for zombies. Not tornados.
To defend yourself form tornados, just throw a bag of salt at it. That way the tornado turns into rain. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:13:58 PM EDT
[#10]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out. it is important to point out that the pressure exerted by the wind increases by the square of the velocity, too. a tornado with twice the wind speed of a hurricane is actually 4 times as strong. Without a doubt and much of the destruction in the area was also attributed to surge as well. But I guess my point was a nice concrete shelter is better than a bathtub or interior hallway. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:14:55 PM EDT
[#11]
Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house?
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:16:00 PM EDT
[#12]
Quoted: Bath tubs are for zombies. Not tornados. To defend yourself form tornados, just throw a bag of salt at it. That way the tornado turns into rain. Or turn on a fan full blast. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:16:25 PM EDT
[#13]
Quoted:
.... But I guess my point was a nice concrete shelter is better than a bathtub or interior hallway. Fuck yes!!! If I had to choose between a regularly constructed residential house and a reinforced concrete vault, I'd be inside the vault in a split second. I agree completely. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:17:12 PM EDT
[#14]
Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. Wednesday, it would have been suicidal for us to have left and tried to outran the storms, unless we had left the night before. Three hours either direction from us was still dangerous. Fortunately, only one of the storms passed over us here....and it passed OVER us. Im not trying to be argumentative. But, with a little experience you too can do as I do.You dont outrun the storms, although I do it all the time, You drop south 1/4 mile - 1 mile and you're out of the path. Sit back and watch with a video cam, throw out the lawn chairs and sip on a beer or something. That all takes some experience I suppose and I take for granted as it seems easy for me, but some people cant grasp that concept. That would have been exceedingly difficult in Southeast TN Wednesday night. We literally had a new tornado warning issued every 15 minutes for a 3.5 hour period. Looking on the radar map, they were everywhere. North, South, East and West. I also imagine it is easier to navigate away from a tornado in the Midwest due to terrain differences. It would have been difficult for the population at large. Im trying to tell you how to survive as an individual. The population at large are instructed to take shelter and die. I know for a fact there were in excess of several dozen chasers on those storms. None of them died. I realize the terrain is difficult in those areas, otherwise I would have been there chasing. But it is doable and was done. You can be like us and do what we do or you can be like them and do what they do. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:17:22 PM EDT
[#15]
Or turn on a fan full blast
Unless the tornado passed over a Waste Water Treatment Plant. That would be much worse thanks to the fan. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:18:53 PM EDT
[#16]
How hard is it to spend a weekend digging a 6x6x6 hole in your back yard Where I live? More than $100. Not sure what it costs to blast a 6^3 hole in the rock around here... |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:19:52 PM EDT
[#17]
Quoted:
Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? 
clicky |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:24:58 PM EDT
[#18]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does.
An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys.
It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I agree. And to illustrate the point: Train versus Tornado For me, I'd rather take my chances underground, period. Or get the hell out of the way, if possible. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:28:35 PM EDT
[#19]
That's a trailer I believe? |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:28:37 PM EDT
[#20]
Stand in your front yard, AK held high and yell "Woollvverrinnneesss!!!!"
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:29:29 PM EDT
[#21]
Quoted: No offense but a train or box cars are not a good analogy. They have alot fo surface area. The surface area makes them more vulnerable to high winds. This is why you always see 18 wheel tractor trailers turned on storms with just strong straight lined winds let alone tornadoes. Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does. An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys. It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I agree. And to illustrate the point: Train versus Tornado For me, I'd rather take my chances underground, period. Or get the hell out of the way, if possible. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:30:55 PM EDT
[#22]
Once a railroad car is blown over and empty of coal, it wouldn't take much to fling it around.
Force from airpressure depends on the surface area of the object being blown. And a train car has alot of surface area to act on. Deosn't take much vacuum, or lower pressure, in a room, to make the door impossible to open. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:31:35 PM EDT
[#23]
Quoted: Quoted: FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out. In order to be certified as a tornado safe shelter for above ground, the design has to be tested by the Texas Tech Wind Research Center. Those designs which pass are awarded a FEMA F-5 rating to withstand an F5 tornado or a Cat 5 hurricane. An EF-5 tornado has wins speeds from 216-318 mph. Most have at least 3/16 steel plate with steel beam ribbing and a door with locking lugs like a safe's door. This website has pictures of a 1989 Lincoln Continental dropped 40 feet onto one of their shelters with no damage to the shelter: http://www.stormsaferoom.com/aboveground/index.htm While I'd rather be below ground, there have been a bunch of people survive direct hits in FEMA certified above ground Safe-rooms. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:32:58 PM EDT
[#24]
Quoted:
Quoted:
No offense but a train or box cars are not a good analogy. They have alot fo surface area. The surface area makes them more vulnerable to high winds. This is why you always see 18 wheel tractor trailers turned on storms with just strong straight lined winds let alone tornadoes.
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does.
An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys.
It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I agree. And to illustrate the point: Train versus Tornado For me, I'd rather take my chances underground, period. Or get the hell out of the way, if possible. Interesting. I didn't think about that. Oh, and I've always wondered about your avatar. Are you a storm chaser? |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:33:29 PM EDT
[#25]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. Wednesday, it would have been suicidal for us to have left and tried to outran the storms, unless we had left the night before. Three hours either direction from us was still dangerous. Fortunately, only one of the storms passed over us here....and it passed OVER us. Im not trying to be argumentative. But, with a little experience you too can do as I do.You dont outrun the storms, although I do it all the time, You drop south 1/4 mile - 1 mile and you're out of the path. Sit back and watch with a video cam, throw out the lawn chairs and sip on a beer or something. That all takes some experience I suppose and I take for granted as it seems easy for me, but some people cant grasp that concept. That would have been exceedingly difficult in Southeast TN Wednesday night. We literally had a new tornado warning issued every 15 minutes for a 3.5 hour period. Looking on the radar map, they were everywhere. North, South, East and West. I also imagine it is easier to navigate away from a tornado in the Midwest due to terrain differences. It would have been difficult for the population at large. Im trying to tell you how to survive as an individual. The population at large are instructed to take shelter and die. I know for a fact there were in excess of several dozen chasers on those storms. None of them died. I realize the terrain is difficult in those areas, otherwise I would have been there chasing. But it is doable and was done. You can be like us and do what we do or you can be like them and do what they do. In a couple of weeks I won't have to worry about it. I scheduled a storm shelter to be installed. Seeing the devastation an F4 caused that touched down a few miles away prompted me to do so. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:34:37 PM EDT
[#26]
Chain yourself to a tree. Preferably two of them?
 
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:35:59 PM EDT
[#27]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out. In order to be certified as a tornado safe shelter for above ground, the design has to be tested by the Texas Tech Wind Research Center. Those designs which pass are awarded a FEMA F-5 rating to withstand an F5 tornado or a Cat 5 hurricane. An EF-5 tornado has wins speeds from 216-318 mph. Most have at least 3/16 steel plate with steel beam ribbing and a door with locking lugs like a safe's door. This website has pictures of a 1989 Lincoln Continental dropped 40 feet onto one of their shelters with no damage to the shelter: http://www.stormsaferoom.com/aboveground/index.htm While I'd rather be below ground, there have been a bunch of people survive direct hits in FEMA certified above ground Safe-rooms. That's pretty impressive!! 
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:37:00 PM EDT
[#28]
Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. Wednesday, it would have been suicidal for us to have left and tried to outran the storms, unless we had left the night before. Three hours either direction from us was still dangerous. Fortunately, only one of the storms passed over us here....and it passed OVER us. Im not trying to be argumentative. But, with a little experience you too can do as I do.You dont outrun the storms, although I do it all the time, You drop south 1/4 mile - 1 mile and you're out of the path. Sit back and watch with a video cam, throw out the lawn chairs and sip on a beer or something. That all takes some experience I suppose and I take for granted as it seems easy for me, but some people cant grasp that concept. That would have been exceedingly difficult in Southeast TN Wednesday night. We literally had a new tornado warning issued every 15 minutes for a 3.5 hour period. Looking on the radar map, they were everywhere. North, South, East and West. I also imagine it is easier to navigate away from a tornado in the Midwest due to terrain differences. It would have been difficult for the population at large. Im trying to tell you how to survive as an individual. The population at large are instructed to take shelter and die. I know for a fact there were in excess of several dozen chasers on those storms. None of them died. I realize the terrain is difficult in those areas, otherwise I would have been there chasing. But it is doable and was done. You can be like us and do what we do or you can be like them and do what they do. In a couple of weeks I won't have to worry about it. I scheduled a storm shelter to be installed. Seeing the devastation an F4 caused that touched down a few miles away prompted me to do so. You do realie that FEMA has grant money available for qualified shelters which reimburses you half the cost up to a certain amount? Be sure you get a shelter with a FEMA F-5 rating or if you ever sell your house, the realtor won't be able to advertise it as having a tornado shelter...without the certificate in hand. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:41:05 PM EDT
[#29]
Quoted:
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Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? http://www.smartsafeshelters.com/img/frontShow/nfs02.jpg clicky Cool, thanks! |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:47:42 PM EDT
[#30]
Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? http://www.smartsafeshelters.com/img/frontShow/nfs02.jpg clicky Cool, thanks! I was looking at a garage floor shelter....until somebody mentioned that they wouldn't want to be burried under their house rubble. It's not like shit doesn't blow everywhere though. I reckon you stand as much chance getting trapped in a shelter in your back yard as in your garage floor. I've been threatening to install one...just haven't gotten around to it. Hell, if there's bad weather comming into my area, I'm usually out storm chasing and SKYWARN spotting for the national weather service. Never home to use it.  |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:49:00 PM EDT
[#31]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? http://www.smartsafeshelters.com/img/frontShow/nfs02.jpg clicky That looks interesting. Jim |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:55:37 PM EDT
[#32]
Quoted: Yes sir, been chasing since 2001. No meteorology degree, just self taught. I chase on the average of 10k miles a year. Quoted: Quoted: No offense but a train or box cars are not a good analogy. They have alot fo surface area. The surface area makes them more vulnerable to high winds. This is why you always see 18 wheel tractor trailers turned on storms with just strong straight lined winds let alone tornadoes. Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does. An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys. It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I agree. And to illustrate the point: Train versus Tornado For me, I'd rather take my chances underground, period. Or get the hell out of the way, if possible. Oh, and I've always wondered about your avatar. Are you a storm chaser? |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 6:59:06 PM EDT
[#33]
I spoke with a lady after a tornado hit my town in 2008. Her family managed to make it to a closet and held the door shut when
the tornado hit. When they came out their house was gone except for that one wall and closet. I took a pic of it while I was speaking with her. Sometimes it helps to be lucky........... |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 7:07:43 PM EDT
[#34]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? http://www.smartsafeshelters.com/img/frontShow/nfs02.jpg clicky I like that. Tornado shelter and change your own oil, or replace the clutch! |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 7:11:52 PM EDT
[#35]
Ok, so I wanted to do a small synopsis of how wind speeds are figured on these storms.
They do a damage assessment. They assess the destroyed buildings, take into account the building practices used in those building and from that determine a wind speed for the tornado. *An example would be, was the sill plate properly toe nailed into the foundation? There are more On another note - Many garage doors will fail between 70 - 100mph wind. Depending on the direction of the winds and the positioning of the residential or commercial property or properties when these doors are breached the wind will find the first place to escape. Usually this is the roof. It is common to see subdivisions with this kind of damage where the wind escapes through the back side of the homes through the roof. If you do a search for the "Enhanced Fujita Scale" you will see that the EF factors EF0, EF1, EF2 etc.. are broken down with damage examples. It is a science. They send in special teams that are experts in this field to study the building practices of the properties destroyed and then through a formula create an EF factor for the tornado. Some basic knowledge of these practices allow me in the field to examine damage and make a "rough" estimation. |
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Posted: 4/29/2011 10:59:13 PM EDT
[#36]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Yes sir, been chasing since 2001. No meteorology degree, just self taught. I chase on the average of 10k miles a year.
Quoted:
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No offense but a train or box cars are not a good analogy. They have alot fo surface area. The surface area makes them more vulnerable to high winds. This is why you always see 18 wheel tractor trailers turned on storms with just strong straight lined winds let alone tornadoes.
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It depends on the strength of the tornado. As a general rule, you want to be in an interior room (no windows) with some structural support - like a closet under a staircase. But, with the strong tornadoes, like F4 and F5, that won't help you. You MUST be underground, in a basement - preferably a reinforced storm shelter in the basment. If you do not have a storm shelter, then under the stairs in your basement. If you do not have a basement, make friends with your neighbor that does.
An F5 will hitting your house will almost certainly kill you if you are not in an underground shelter. You dont believe a safe room will survive an F5? An above-ground safe room? If the house is directly hit, no. Remember, the Tri-State tornado of 1925 picked up railroad cars loaded with coal and tossed them around like toys.
It would have to be phenomenally well-constructed - like massive welded steel beams and reinforced concrete - before I'd have much confidence if an F5 was coming. If an F5 is coming, I want to be in a safe room underground. There's not going to be much of ANYTHING left above-ground. I agree. And to illustrate the point: Train versus Tornado For me, I'd rather take my chances underground, period. Or get the hell out of the way, if possible. Oh, and I've always wondered about your avatar. Are you a storm chaser? You, sir, are freakin' awesome. Two thumbs up.
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Posted: 4/30/2011 3:51:08 AM EDT
[#37]
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Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. Wednesday, it would have been suicidal for us to have left and tried to outran the storms, unless we had left the night before. Three hours either direction from us was still dangerous. Fortunately, only one of the storms passed over us here....and it passed OVER us. Im not trying to be argumentative. But, with a little experience you too can do as I do.You dont outrun the storms, although I do it all the time, You drop south 1/4 mile - 1 mile and you're out of the path. Sit back and watch with a video cam, throw out the lawn chairs and sip on a beer or something. That all takes some experience I suppose and I take for granted as it seems easy for me, but some people cant grasp that concept. That would have been exceedingly difficult in Southeast TN Wednesday night. We literally had a new tornado warning issued every 15 minutes for a 3.5 hour period. Looking on the radar map, they were everywhere. North, South, East and West. I also imagine it is easier to navigate away from a tornado in the Midwest due to terrain differences. It would have been difficult for the population at large. Im trying to tell you how to survive as an individual. The population at large are instructed to take shelter and die. I know for a fact there were in excess of several dozen chasers on those storms. None of them died. I realize the terrain is difficult in those areas, otherwise I would have been there chasing. But it is doable and was done. You can be like us and do what we do or you can be like them and do what they do. In a couple of weeks I won't have to worry about it. I scheduled a storm shelter to be installed. Seeing the devastation an F4 caused that touched down a few miles away prompted me to do so. You do realie that FEMA has grant money available for qualified shelters which reimburses you half the cost up to a certain amount? Be sure you get a shelter with a FEMA F-5 rating or if you ever sell your house, the realtor won't be able to advertise it as having a tornado shelter...without the certificate in hand. I did not know that. Thanks for telling me. The shelter being installed is F5 rated and has been tested by Texas Tech. It also comes with an engineer's seal of approval, so it should qualify. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 4:00:09 AM EDT
[#38]
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Is it possible to cut a hole in a slab foundation and build a storm shelter under it/the house? http://www.smartsafeshelters.com/img/frontShow/nfs02.jpg clicky Cool, thanks! I was looking at a garage floor shelter....until somebody mentioned that they wouldn't want to be burried under their house rubble. It's not like shit doesn't blow everywhere though. I reckon you stand as much chance getting trapped in a shelter in your back yard as in your garage floor. I've been threatening to install one...just haven't gotten around to it. Hell, if there's bad weather comming into my area, I'm usually out storm chasing and SKYWARN spotting for the national weather service. Never home to use it.
most that i have been looking at include an escape jack....kind of an elongated bottle jack that is stored in the shelter. if something lands on top, you can use the jack to push the door open. note that from my limited reading some in-slab garage shelters aren't allowed by some localities. apparently someone spilled some gas in their garage, and gravity being what it is, it leaked into the shelter. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 4:19:25 AM EDT
[#39]
Quoted: Id like to point out that while the "drive out of the way" plan works for some it doesn't work for most (small kids, the elderly). For example, the storms that tore up Alabama get didnt to my AO until around midnight. Local TV radar shows very little usable info and the twisters form and dissipate here so quickly that they rarely give advance warning until well after the thing is on the ground. And the weather is shitty *everywhere*, wind, hail, lightning, rain, debris, it's not like you can look way out and say "oh, there's a twister". When the whole state is covered with tornadic activity theres no where to run.Quoted: Hide under your blankey.. lol Why not just get out of the way? That's what I do, seems to work for me. Requires a little situational awareness and or some radar software if its at night. The official position of the NWS is to take cover. The reason being is they don't want hundreds or thousands of residents trying to get in their cars and drive, clogging up traffic and mass chaos. Use that to your advantage. There it is. The Alabama storms the other day had 15 to 20 minutes of advance warning most places. People 'sheltered-in-place'.....and died. Most of them had plenty of time to get in their rigs and drive out of the storm's path. The biggest cell that threatened my house got by us and ended up not spawning any tornado. The one that threatened one of the towns I have family in ended up forming one and killed a few people and caused massive property damage. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 4:25:23 AM EDT
[#40]
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Tornado, Hide in the bathtub? Hurricane, Hide in the washing machine? Kind of obvious isn't it ? Tornado=bathtub Hurricane=washing machine Earthquake=dryer Volcano=stove Fog=garbage can Snowstorm=breadbox c'mon people, this is elementary |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 4:54:27 AM EDT
[#41]
Yeah, our drive out of the way plan would have been a little touchy this week too. Sporadic tornadoes covering two counties heading east to northeast.
We though we were going to get hit in Southern Dallas county, but they would hit our colder air and turn due east. Luckily, the front had pushed through just enough to keep us safe. It was scary watching the tv radar and listening to the storm spotters on HAM radio talk about it heading directly for us, then have it turn less than 10 miles out. Even after I thought it was over, 3 hours later, another cell made a close call. I thought we were done and was watching movies on tv. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:17:05 AM EDT
[#42]
Gunsafe for me.
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:19:28 AM EDT
[#43]
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Gunsafe for me. How do you lock it from inside then unlock it to get out? 
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:21:36 AM EDT
[#44]
that is a sink
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:35:28 AM EDT
[#45]
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FWIW MS Coast after Katrina. Most of that entire area was completely gone. This was a bank vault. Stronger than a typical safe room I know, but some concrete structures seem better than an "interior room". http://i53.tinypic.com/2eppkj4.jpg Katrina's wind speed when it hit land was about 140 mph, and weakened as it went inland. An F5 tornado has wind speeds of 261 - 318 mph - over TWICE of Katrina's wind strength. I agree a bank vault would be a good place to hide, but I would still rather be underground when faced with 300+ mph winds. Keep in mind that it's not just the WIND, but things like cars and trucks, trees, buildings, cows, etc. thrown by a 300 mph wind that you have to worry about. Would that small local branch vault survive a Ford F-150 hitting it at 200 mph? I wouldn't want to find out. In order to be certified as a tornado safe shelter for above ground, the design has to be tested by the Texas Tech Wind Research Center. Those designs which pass are awarded a FEMA F-5 rating to withstand an F5 tornado or a Cat 5 hurricane. An EF-5 tornado has wins speeds from 216-318 mph. Most have at least 3/16 steel plate with steel beam ribbing and a door with locking lugs like a safe's door. This website has pictures of a 1989 Lincoln Continental dropped 40 feet onto one of their shelters with no damage to the shelter: http://www.stormsaferoom.com/aboveground/index.htm While I'd rather be below ground, there have been a bunch of people survive direct hits in FEMA certified above ground Safe-rooms. A hulled out car means nothing to me, they didnt even drop it square on top of the structure, so it ended up taking a % of a % of an actual car. Now, leave the driveline in that car, and throw it at that steel box at 200 mph, and lets see what happens. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:40:14 AM EDT
[#46]
How do gun safes do in a tornado?
Anyone know? Im assuming one bolted down properly would do pretty well, but would be fucked if hit by big flying stuff. Most RSC's are not capable of holding much of a load Im guessing |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:41:15 AM EDT
[#47]
Hide Ya Burger, Hide Ya Fries, Cause Tornado's stealin' everybody's Fast Food!
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:47:28 AM EDT
[#48]
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my apartment is about 150 yards from an overpass. the other day when we were on a tornado watch, i had radar up and was planning to head there if anything touched down. Don't go for the overpass. Those people in the famous overpass video survived because that tornado wasn't all that strong. An overpass creates a venturi, and wind speeds will generally be higher under the overpass. Others have been sucked out from overpasses by tornados. This. You are supposedly better off laying flat in a ditch if you have no other options. |
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Posted: 4/30/2011 5:56:18 AM EDT
[#49]
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How hard is it to spend a weekend digging a 6x6x6 hole in your back yard
Where I live? More than $100. Not sure what it costs to blast a 6^3 hole in the rock around here... i would probably need a Kobelco 300 for a day.. Possibly a Kent to put on it as well.. hand digging for an 18' above ground pool, the deepest we dug was 14" on one side 3" on the other, had to dig out 4 good size boulders in the process. Took 2-1/2 days.. My yard sucks for digging. |
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Posted: 5/1/2011 8:24:24 AM EDT
[#50]
Quoted: Yeah, our drive out of the way plan would have been a little touchy this week too. Sporadic tornadoes covering two counties heading east to northeast. We though we were going to get hit in Southern Dallas county, but they would hit our colder air and turn due east. Luckily, the front had pushed through just enough to keep us safe. It was scary watching the tv radar and listening to the storm spotters on HAM radio talk about it heading directly for us, then have it turn less than 10 miles out. Even after I thought it was over, 3 hours later, another cell made a close call. I thought we were done and was watching movies on tv. I was one of those spotters chasing those storms out south of DFW the other day and giving reports via ham radio. I had zero problem staying out of their way. Tornadoes, generally, aren't very broad at the base. The tornado which stayed on the ground and did so much damage in Alabama was an anomaly...it was a very large wedge shaped tornado, a long tracking one at that. Estimates I heard was that it was between a 1/2 mile and a mile wide at it's base. Most tornadoes are rope shaped and are less than 100 yards across at their base. Usually, a super-cell only has one general area in which tornadoes form and those cells are many miles wide. Therefore, on a cell that's 20 miles wide, only one area is apt to spawn tornadoes. Even if it spawns multiple vortices, they will generally only be several hundred yards wide. That leaves a lot of miles available to get out of the way of a few hundred yard wide area which may have funnels. 99.999999% of the time, one can elude being in the path of a tornado by moving 1/4 to 1/2 a mile lateral to it's path. They aren't 'counties wide'. |
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