12/8/2023 0 Comments Joplin tornado death toll"It's easy to see why we had destruction."ĪccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Bob Smerbeck said the tornado resulted in severe damage, especially to the local hospital, which took a direct hit. "You've got a spinning, destructive tornado with 200-mile-per-hour winds taking so long to move through a given area," Runnels said. Making matters worse, at times the tornado was moving at just 15 miles per hour, leaving a lot of time for it to cause destruction as it roared across the Joplin landscape. "It is rare for a tornado to remain on the ground for that length of time," Steve Runnels, warning coordination meteorologist for the NWS in Springfield, Missouri, told AccuWeather. The massive twister was on the ground for 38 minutes. The tornado itself was up to a mile wide, and the length of its path was 22 miles. history, the tornado is ranked seventh-deadliest and 2011 was the fourth-deadliest year for tornadoes in U.S. The tornado that struck Joplin on that Sunday afternoon in 2011 caused a total of 161 fatalities and over 1,000 additional injuries - making it the deadliest in modern-day recorded history, which dates back to 1950. EF5 tornadoes account for less than 1% of all tornadoes that occur, and one has not occurred in the U.S. The Joplin tornado was rated an EF5, the highest intensity on the Enhanced Fujita Scale with wind speeds surpassing 200 mph. ![]() ![]() When he got off the plane, news reports were saying that the death toll had reached the 60s - a death toll Smith said was "unheard of" from a single tornado in the era of tornado warnings. The next day he caught a flight to AccuWeather's headquarters in State College, Pennsylvania, so he was not able to stay in the loop with the latest information on the tornado. "The thunderstorm was 135 miles away yet it looked remarkably clear," he said. Smith said that when his eyes landed on that sight, which he was viewing from quite a distance, he knew he would need to go home and turn on the news to find out what was going on in Joplin. "They looked unusually large and violent." "As I was driving back home to Wichita, I could see the thunderstorms over Joplin, which is unusual," Smith recalled in an interview with AccuWeather. “We are now on pace for a record year for tornado fatalities,” Schneider said.Former AccuWeather Senior Vice President and Chief Innovation Executive Mike Smith was driving to his home in Wichita, Kansas, when he witnessed the formation of the tornado firsthand. Sunday’s deadly tornadoes came just weeks after a similar series of twisters killed more than 300 people across the South.Īt least 481 people have died in tornadoes so far this year – a grim toll that could grow as twister season hits its peak, said Russell Schneider, director of the National Weather Service‘s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla. National Weather Service Director Jack Hayes said the Missouri storm has been given a preliminary label of EF4 – the second-highest rating for twisters – and had gusts of 190 to 198 mph. At least one person was killed in Minnesota, but the devastation was by far the heaviest in Missouri. The Joplin twister was one of 68 that touched down across seven Midwestern states on Sunday. That’s really what it looked like,” said Joplin High School Principal Kerry Sachetta. “You see pictures of World War II, the devastation and all that with the bombing. ![]() In all, 2,000 buildings were damaged, officials said. ![]() It also demolished a school and heavily damaged scores of homes and churches. John’s Regional Medical Center – killing at least five there. Rescuers and trained dogs went door to door but were slowed by downed power lines, jagged debris and gas-fed fires that raged throughout the city.
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