December Tornadoes

I stayed up late, regretfully, Friday night following the progress of a storm tracker, little knowing that I was watching a historic December event.

On Friday evening after I did my usual data gathering, I switched to YouTube to see if there was any weather news and up popped up was a live video by one of the storm chasers, Reed Timmer. I knew there was going to be storms in my area late Friday night and I had been seeing tiny news indicating tornadic activity (not in my area though – just thunderstorms). When that video popped up, I thought why not? while I wait for the rain and lightning to hit my area.

I think I was up until 3 in the morning, watching the live and reading the comments, little understanding that a real tragedy was occurring. There were references to catastrophic damages, but I thought people might have been hyperbolic. In one instance, I read a comment about “wow, that’s a huge wedge tornado” and I was thinking, “how can you see? it’s so dark!” There would be flashes of lightning so quick that it was hard to catch the sight of a tornado. In one instance, there was a flash and I thought I saw a tornado, but it was hard to tell. And size is kind of hard to tell.

But I did read some comments about the tornado coming their way in Kentucky and to pray for them.

I know nothing about tornadoes, so a wedge tornado means nothing to me. I know nothing about how long a tornado stays on the ground, although I’m under the impression that they don’t stay in contact with the ground for long.

I was watching a historic event without knowing it was a historic event. I just had no clue.

There were a few comments about it being strange that we were having a tornado in December, but I do remember reading somewhere that December tornadoes are not that uncommon because every year we do have a cold front clashing with a warm front when winter starts to roll in.

It has only been in the last two days when the impact of the storms has been playing out in the news that I realize the severity of these storms. The mass destruction is shocking and sad. The weather people do say that these storms were historic due to 1) the extreme damaged caused by the storm, and 2) the presence of one tornado that cut a destructive path for 250 miles – a record. Six states were impacted by these storms.

Are these storms related to climate change? At this point, it is hard to tell because we do get December tornadoes, maybe not this severe. A one time event is not enough to declare climate change is causing these catastrophic tornadoes. If we have a couple of years of strong December tornado activity, then maybe yes. At this point the jury is out.