Dangerous Tornadoes in History

April 9, 1947, started like any normal Wednesday, with a forecast of possible thunderstorms. Around 3:30pm, the temperature started to rise and the barometric pressure and humidity dropped. This event caused atmospheric instability, which created a strong thunderstorm known as a supercell. At 7:52 pm, the storm spawned an F5 tornado, which tore through the Texas panhandle, killing 101 and injuring 782. The most dangerous part of this was that not even expert forecasters knew it was coming. This incident proves how unpredictable tornadoes can be. The violent tornado unleashed its worst destruction on Woodward, striking the city without warning at 8:42 pm. Over 100 city blocks on the west and north sides of the city were destroyed with lesser damage in the southeast portion of the town. Confusion and fires reigned in the aftermath with over 1000 homes and businesses destroyed, at least 107 people killed in and around Woodward, and early 1000 additional injuries.

 Normal communications between Woodward and the outside world were not restored for some time and there was great uncertainty as to victim status. In fact, the bodies of three children were never identified, and one child who survived the tornado was lost and never reunited with her family. Help for Woodward came from many places, including units from as far away as Oklahoma City and Wichita. Beyond Woodward, the tornado lost some intensity, but still destroyed 36 homes and injured 30 people in Woods County before dissipating. This was a time before most towns could afford sirens, so the only people that were warned lived inside town, where the sheriff drove around with his car's siren on, as this was the only way to warn people quickly.

 In Oklahoma and Kansas on May 3, 1999, a warm front coming from the north collided with a cold front coming from the west. Causing many supercell thunderstorms to form. The strongest of which being storm A. Around 4:00pm the storm dropped its first tornado, labeled A-1, a weak F-0 that was on the ground for around a minute. The storm produced 7 more small tornadoes, the strongest of which being an F-3. Around 4:45pm, storm A formed an F-1 tornado that would later intensify and tear through the moore suburbs, this tornado was labeled A-9.

As the storm intensified, NWS meteorologists realized the danger to the oklahoma city area and, when the storm intensified to an F-5, the warnings manager at the SPC knew people would not take a simple tornado warning seriously enough, so for the first time in history, he issued a tornado emergency. As the tornado targeted Moore and Oklahoma City, having already destroyed Bridge Creek, was only growing stronger. Around this time was when the NWS Doppler On Wheels measured the highest wind speed ever recorded on earth was measured, 318 MPH.