Tornado Records | The Worst of All Time
The Deadliest, Longest, Farthest, Biggest, and more. See the tornado records in this post…
There are A LOT of tornadoes every year, about 1,200 on average. Since there are a lot of tornadoes just in a year, there have to be some pretty big tornado records, right? If you thought that, then you are right! From the biggest tornado ever to the tornado that produced the fastest wind speed ever recorded, we will go through all the tornado records.
This post is all about the terrifying tornado records.
Shocking Tornado Records
The Biggest
The largest tornado ever was the El Reno tornado that occurred on May 31, 2013. The El Reno tornado width, at its peak, was 2.6 miles wide. That is longer than Central Park! The tornado killed four people. One of the main reasons this tornado is so well known across the storm-chasing community is that four storm chasers were killed in this tornado. Three of them were storm chasing together. Legendary tornado scientist Tim Samaras, his son Paul Samaras, and a researcher called Carl Young. A local, amateur storm chaser was killed when chasing the storm, too. The Central Oklahoma tornado flipped a van with a Weather Channel crew in it. The tornado caught so many storm chasers off guard because of its unusual track & strength variation.
This tornado has the second fastest tornado windspeeds recorded in history.
The Strongest
The strongest tornado ever was the May 3, 1999 Moore tornado. The most likely strongest wind speed in the tornado was 301 mph. That is almost 4.5 times faster than the top speed of a cheetah! There is some debate about the strongest tornado ever, though. Like the El Reno tornado had measured windspeeds of 302 mph, which was in a very strong suction vortex. The windspeed measured of the Moore tornado was in the main funnel. So that means that the suction vortices of the over 300 mph tornado could have had much higher wind speeds. There are other tornadoes that people debate were stronger, like the Jarrel tornado, which lifted some foundations from the ground. But some also say that the extreme damage was from the tornado staying over the neighborhood for several minutes.
The Longest-Lasting
The March 18, 1925, Tri-State tornado was the longest-lasting tornado ever. The tornado managed to travel 219 miles! That is around 4/5 as long as the Grand Canyon! The Tri-State tornado is also the deadliest in U.S. history & has the forward speed record (there is some debate though). This tornado moved at 73 mph at one point. There is some debate on the length of this tornado, though. Some say that because communication was limited and the low population density in that area, there could have been another tornado from the same supercell. They mean that the initial tornado didn’t last that long but dissipated at some point earlier in the track, and later spawned more. This is a very likely scenario, but we don’t know, and we might never know.
The Costliest
The costliest tornado on record was the May 22, 2011 Joplin Tornado. The tornado causes $3,640,000,000 in damages in Joplin. That is over $92 for every person in California! The tornado killed 158 people directly with eight more indirectly killed. It went down as the seventh-deadliest tornado in U.S. history. This particular tornado is one of the most infamous tornadoes in U.S. history. This was because of the massive amount of damage the tornado caused, with over 8,000 structures being damaged/destroyed. Joplin was also not just your smaller country town, with a population at the time of 50,000 people. The amount of money donated from the public was also huge, with about $39 million in donations to Joplin.
The Deadliest
The April 26, 1989, Daulatpur–Saturia tornado was the deadliest tornado in the world on record, with it resulting in 1,300 deaths. That is over 1.5 times larger than the population of Vatican City, the smallest country in the world. This death toll is an estimate and not an exact number. 12,000 people were injured & 80,000 more became homeless from the 1989 Bangladesh tornado. A Bangladesh newspaper said that the area was completely devasted & whole trees had bark stripped from them. Because of the devastating death toll, some would call it the worst tornado in history.
Largest Tornado Outbreak
The largest tornado outbreak ever was the April 25-28, 2011 Super Outbreak. 360 tornadoes were part of that outbreak. That is more tornadoes than sesame seeds on the average burger bun! The worst day of the outbreak was April 27th, which was also the day where the most tornadoes happened in 24 hours, 219. On the 27th, there were also FOUR EF-5 TORNADOES! On average, there is less than one EF-5 tornado a year! 11 other EF-4 tornadoes also happened. 348 people died in the system and there was $10.2 billion in damages.
Longest Distance Carried (Person)
Matt Suter, on March 12, 2006, was thrown 1,307 feet when an F-2 tornado struck his grand-mothers mobile home. That is longer than the height than the Empire State Building. He was watching TV at the time, and then the tornado rapidly approced them. Matt, his Grandma, & Uncle had barely any time to think because the tornado was just moving that fast. Apparently when the tornado hit the mobile home, a lamp hit his head and he was knocked unconcious. He woke up 1,307 feet away from his mobile home. He was 19 years old at the time.
Month With Most Tornadoes
The most tornadoes in any recorded month was 817 tornadoes in April 2011, according to the National Weather Service. There were so many tornadoes because of the conditions present in the atmosphere that month. The ENSO regions played a factor in it, too. So many 100+ tornado outbreaks happened that month, including the 2011 Super Outbreak. The 2011 Super Outbreak overshadowed all of the other April tornadoes and that resulted in those major outbreaks are not talked about very much. The 2011 tornadoes were just really bad in general, even outside of April.
Longest EF-5 Tornado Drought
From May 20, 2013, to present day is the longest EF-5 tornado drought on record. From the time of writing this, it would be 3,898 days. That is 60,000 times as long as the playing time of a soccer match! The EF-5 tornado struck Moore on May 20, 2013 stuck Moore, OK. There were 24 Moore tornado victims in 39 minutes. Of those 24, seven children died while at Plaza Towers Elementary School. The children died when the walls fell on top of them while they were sheltering in the hallway. The tornado brought the communities painful memories of the 1999 Moore tornado that also devastated the community.
Most Tornadoes Spawned By Hurricane
The hurricane that spawned the most tornadoes was Hurricane Ivan. There were 120 Hurricane Ivan tornadoes that spanned from Florida to Pennsylvania. That is more tornadoes than elements on the periodic table! It began on September 15, 2004, killed seven people, & resulted in $96.9 million dollars in damages. The outbreak also hold the record for the most tornadoes for a September tornado outbreak.
