Tornado: spectacular natural disaster - Classification. The most dangerous tornado Tornado f5

The first criterion is appearance one tornado or another. In accordance with it, the appearance of a tornado is described, which may vary depending on the power of the tornado. In this regard, there are:

• whip-like tornado - a classic-looking tornado, which is a smooth winding "pillar" of a tornado funnel, the length (height) of which significantly exceeds its own radius. Such tornadoes usually have the least power, since the diameter of the tornado funnel is a clear expression of the speed of the vortex air movement;
• blurry tornadoes - the kind of similar tornado is essential feature danger. The fact is that large and powerful tornadoes, which are the most destructive, belong precisely to the vague type. It is characterized by the absence of clear boundaries of the funnel column and actually looks like a vertical cloud. Often the diameter of the funnel of such a tornado exceeds, and quite significantly, its height;
• composite tornadoes - tornadoes consisting of several tornadoes, one of which is the central and largest, and the rest are its "satellites". At the same time, their harmlessness against the background of their "big brother" can be deceptive - such tornadoes are capable of having a high destructive potential.

The second criterion for the classification of a tornado is its “stuffing”, that is, those material particles that are drawn into the funnel by the vortex movement of air and make up the “body” of a tornado. The “body” of a tornado is most pronounced in a water tornado, when an air funnel forms above the water surface and then draws water into itself. There are also ground tornadoes, which are characterized by a combination of factors such as very high wind speeds in tornadoes and geological instability.

As a result of an earthquake or landslide, solid massifs of rock or soil begin to move - and at this moment a tornado can come into contact with them. Finally, there is such an exotic and the highest degree spectacular kind of tornado, like a fiery tornado. In this case, it is necessary to separate the fire tornado, which was formed as a result of the dragging of fire (from a natural fire or volcanic eruption) into a tornado, from an independent fire tornado. The latter can occur during large-scale fires, when separate sources of ignition over a large area are combined into one, and, of course, do not apply to tornadoes.

Main criterion

The third and main criterion for distinguishing tornado categories is the power of tornadoes, that is, the speed of the wind in the vortex flows of a tornado. A special tornado scale was created, the so-called Fujita scale, in which all tornadoes are divided into five categories depending on wind speed. Formally, there are thirteen categories in the Fujita scale, but categories from the seventh and above are theoretical - scientists so far cannot determine wind speeds exceeding 512 kilometers per hour. Therefore, all the most powerful tornadoes automatically receive the sixth category, F5. Here are the first six categories of the tornado scale:

• F0, storm tornado - wind speeds range from 64 to 116 kilometers per hour. Able to tear down signs and break old dry trees;
• F1, moderate tornado - wind speeds up to 180 kilometers per hour. Rip roofs off houses, move cars;
• F2, significant tornado - wind speeds up to 253 kilometers per hour. Can uproot large trees;
• F3, strong tornado - wind speed up to 332 kilometers per hour. It can lift cars into the air and bring down the walls of capital buildings;
• F4, destructive tornado - wind speed up to 418 kilometers per hour. Able to completely destroy stationary buildings and carry heavy objects over considerable distances;
• F5, incredible tornado - wind speeds up to 512 kilometers per hour. It is characterized by absolute destruction up to the tearing off of the upper layer of the asphalt pavement.

There is no shortage of tornadoes

Tornadoes have long been part of the life and culture of modern mankind. This phenomenon of nature has even acquired a certain attractive meaning as an expression of something energetic, powerful, saturated. For example, even the rose "Tornado" has appeared, which has a bright orange-red color, which florists describe as an "explosion of color". Reporting tornadoes is not uncommon these days - in the US alone, apart from the rest of the world, more than a thousand tornadoes occur each year. In 2013, for example, there were reports of tornadoes in Australia: in Queensland, three tornadoes at once caused damage to at least 17,000 people. Also in 2013, a tornado was observed in Japan: a tornado passed several tens of kilometers north of Tokyo, destroying more than five hundred buildings, about 30 people were injured, one person died.

But still, the most famous tornadoes are characterized by a much more significant scale of destruction and casualties. For example, the 1964 tornado in Bangladesh is famous for killing at least 500 people. At the same time, there is almost no information about this disaster, the details are unknown, and some data say that the number of victims could be about one and a half thousand people. In 1969, on the same day, two powerful tornadoes passed through the territory of eastern Pakistan. One of them led to the death of about 650 people, the second killed another 220 people. The most severe in terms of human lives lost today is considered to be a tornado in Bangladesh, the number of confirmed victims is 1300 with twelve thousand injured.

Alexander Babitsky

World mythology is full of fantastic, invincible and deadly creatures. In reality, for everything that threatens us, either nature or humanity is responsible. However, of all the destructive forces that exist on our planet, few can compare with mythical monsters, except perhaps a tornado. These whirlwinds descend from heaven like punishing swords and rise like Atlanteans above the tallest buildings.

What are these destructive natural titans? In this article, we will look at what tornadoes look like, how they form, and how tornadoes are classified.

Let's go to the bathroom

We've all seen the spiral of water that forms when water flows out of a tub, right? Then we all witnessed the fundamental design of the tornado. During the drain, the water forms a vortex - a spiral funnel into which water particles are drawn. Since the drain draws in too much water, not all particles can immediately go to the very bottom, but they all tend to go there, accelerating and creating a spiral rotation in the process. In a tornado, the same thing happens, only the movement is created not by water, but by air, and it is directed not down, but up.

However, what kind of weather conditions are needed for the formation of tornadoes? After all, they can not just appear out of nowhere.

Thunderclouds and whirlwinds

Indeed, they cannot! Tornadoes are formed from thunderclouds that already have an upward flow of moist, warm air.

Thunderclouds, in turn, form like all other clouds: warm, moist air rises and cools, causing water vapor to collect into a single mass. However, if the upward flow of air does not weaken, the clouds continue to grow and rise higher, where the vapors become liquid and then freeze.

An ordinary thundercloud can thus collect an incredible amount of energy, which, in turn, only increases the upward flow of air.

Clouds form when air vapor condenses and the moisture in them begins to change its physical state from gaseous to liquid to solid. This process releases a huge amount of heat, and heat is a form of energy.

A gram of water formed from steam releases 600 calories of heat, and when it freezes in the upper troposphere, another 80 calories are added to them. All this heat greatly enhances the flow of air towards the cloud.

Considering that a standard thundercloud can weigh tens of millions of tons, one can imagine how many calories of heat it generates. But a tornado is formed far from a standard cloud.

mesocyclone

The place of formation of tornadoes is a giant thundercloud called a supercell. It differs from the usual ones not only in weight and size, but also in the presence of a mesocyclone - special conditions favorable for the formation of a tornado. Supercells, due to their incredible strength and energy, form a spiraling flow of air, reminiscent of the vortex that we observed in the bathroom.

As soon as a mesocyclone appears in a thundercloud, the probability of a tornado in the next half hour rises to 50%. The air vortex descends to the surface of the earth and can reach speeds of 500 kilometers per hour. Reaching the surface, a tornado turns into an unpredictable stream that brings destruction and turns everything - from debris, trees and animals, to cars - into deadly projectiles.

The tornado remains driven by the thundercloud that gave birth to it. Often the tornado "jumps", that is, it is interrupted in one place and resumed in another.

Small tornadoes can last only a few minutes and travel about a kilometer. Stronger whirlwinds can last for hours, covering a distance of hundreds of kilometers, while the elements cause irreparable damage to both nature and man.

Tornado classification

Tornadoes were originally classified according to the Fujitz scale, named after the meteorologist who proposed it in 1971. In 2007, the scale was slightly revised and named the Enhanced Fujita Scale. On a scale of tornadoes are divided into six types:

• F0 - wind speed up to 116 km per hour, minor damage - torn branches, bent road signs, torn chimneys;
• F1 - wind speed from 117 to 180 km per hour, moderate damage - blown roofing, overturned motor homes, cars demolished from the highway;
• F2 - wind speed from 181 to 253 km per hour, significant damage - uprooted trees, destroyed mobile homes, demolished roofs, overturned railway cars;
• F3 - wind speed from 254 to 332 km per hour, serious damage - destroyed forests, overturned trains, destroyed houses;
• F4 - wind speed from 333 to 418 km per hour, colossal destruction - houses and other small buildings removed from the foundation, cars lifted into the air;
• F5 - wind speed 419-512 km per hour, incredible damage - destroyed buildings made of reinforced concrete.

A tornado (in America this phenomenon is called a tornado) is a fairly stable atmospheric vortex, most often occurring in thunderclouds. It is visualized as a dark funnel, often descending to the surface of the earth. The wind speed in a tornado develops very high - even in weak whirlwinds it reaches 170 km / h, and in some F5 tornadoes a real hurricane rages inside - 500 km / h. Such a natural phenomenon can bring considerable destruction. Tornadoes occur in different parts of the world, but most of all tornadoes and tornadoes occur in the United States, in the so-called "tornado alley".

1. Daulatpur Saturia, Bangladesh (1989)

The greatest destruction and casualties were caused by a tornado that hit Bangladesh on April 26, 1989. In this country, tornadoes are almost as frequent as on the North American continent. The diameter of the tornado exceeded 1.5 kilometers, it traveled 80 kilometers through the Manikganj district in the center of the country. The cities of Saturia and Daulatpur suffered the most. 1,300 people died and 12,000 were injured. A powerful air whirlwind easily lifted into the air and carried away fragile buildings from the poorest areas of cities. Part settlements was completely destroyed, and 80,000 inhabitants were left homeless.

2. East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) (1969)

This drama played out in 1969, when Dhaka and its surrounding lands were still the eastern part of Pakistan. The tornado hit the northeastern outskirts of Dhaka, passing through densely populated areas. At that time, 660 people died, and another 4,000 were injured. On that day, two tornadoes passed through these places at once. The impact of the second fell on the Camille region in the Homna Upazila region and claimed the lives of 223 people. Both tornadoes were the result of one storm, but after the occurrence they went along different routes.

Ecological disasters have their own specifics - during them not a single person may die, but at the same time a very significant amount will be inflicted ...

3. Madarganj-Mrizapur, Bangladesh (1996)

Proportionately, a small country like Bangladesh is probably even more affected by tornadoes than the United States. And the poverty of the population turns into the largest harvest of victims, which is collected here by the elements. No matter how people study this formidable natural phenomenon, but in 1996 it again took its share of victims. This time, 700 Bangladeshis were killed and about 80,000 of their houses were destroyed.

4. Tri-State Tornado, USA (1925)

For a long time, this tornado that passed through the United States in the first quarter of the last century was considered the most destructive. Its trajectory ran on March 18 through the territory of three states at once - Missouri, Indiana and Illinois. On the Fujita scale, he was awarded the highest category F5. 50,000 Americans were left homeless, over 2,000 were injured, and 695 people died. Most people died in southern Illinois, and other cities were completely destroyed by the wind. The tornado raged for 3.5 hours, moving from state to state at a speed of about 100 km/h.
At that time, there was no television, no Internet, and no special means of warning about the approach of a catastrophe, so most people were taken by surprise. According to eyewitnesses, the diameter of the tornado funnel reached one and a half kilometers. The element caused damage to the then 16.5 million dollars (now it would be over 200 million). On this tragic day, 9 tornadoes raged across 7 states of America, from which a total of 747 inhabitants died during the day.

5. La Valetta, Malta (1961 or 1965)

It would seem that such an island as far from such surprises of nature as Malta in the last century also had to experience the power of angry nature on itself. This vortex was born above the surface mediterranean sea and then headed towards the island. Having sunk and broken most of the ships in the Grand Harbor Bay, he went to land, where he was able to take the lives of over 600 Maltese. The most amazing thing is that the exact date eyewitnesses indicate this catastrophe in different ways: for some it happened in 1961, and for others in 1965. Although, for sure, they wrote about it in the newspapers of that time.

Throughout human history strongest earthquakes more than once they inflicted colossal damage on people and were the cause of a huge number of victims among the population ...

6. Sicily, Italy (1851)

But this much older tornado is mentioned in many chronicles, it still attracts the attention of meteorologists and historians. An exact count of the victims was not carried out then, but there were no less than 600 people. It is assumed that the tornado acquired its colossal destructive power when two tornadoes came to land at once and merged into one. Although history has not left any evidence for this, therefore this assumption will remain a hypothesis.

7. Narail and Magura, Bangladesh (1964)

Another tornado that occurred in 1964 in long-suffering Bangladesh devastated two cities and seven villages to boot. Approximately 500 people died, and another 1,400 were declared missing. Despite the scale of this tragedy, very little information about it has reached the world community.

8 Comoros (1951)

The coast of Africa was also vulnerable to this type of element. In 1951, a giant tornado raged in earnest in the Comoros, taking the lives of more than 500 islanders, as well as travelers from France. Could the latter assume that the earthly paradise, where they came to get pleasure, will turn into a pitch hell? In those years, the islands were under the protectorate of France, which decided not to disclose the details of the tragedy.

9. Gainesville, Georgia and Tupelo, Mississippi, USA (1936)

A powerful tornado, which received an F5 category in Gainesville, and an F4 category in Tupelo, literally and figuratively claimed the lives of about 450 people, and their exact number could not be established. At first, the elements hit the city of Tupelo - it happened on April 5, 1936. At least 203 residents were killed there and another 1,600 received injuries of varying severity. There are no exact figures for the victims, but since the newspapers did not take into account the casualties among the Negro population at that time, they must have been much higher.
The world was lucky that one year-old child survived in this pitch hell, whom we later learned under the name of Elvis Presley. The very next day, a tornado that passed Alabama attacked the city of Gainesville, located in Georgia. The Cooper Pants factory was especially affected by the disaster - 70 of its workers died, and another 40 could not be found, and therefore they fell into the category of missing persons. In total, 216 people died in this city, and the state counted losses of 13 million dollars (today it would be 200 million). At the beginning of that April, numerous tornadoes of various strengths hit 6 different states: Arkansas, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina.

Natural hazards are extreme climatic or meteorological phenomena that occur naturally in a particular area.

10. Yangtze, China (2015)

In recent decades, people have learned to fairly accurately predict the appearance of strong tornadoes, began to build protective structures in dangerous areas, so in the event of a threat of a tornado, people can quickly evacuate. But even all these precautions did not help the Chinese in 2015, when a tornado suddenly hit a peaceful river cruise ship from heaven. 442 people died, but other ships warned in time escaped disaster.
From these cases, it becomes quite clear how such an impressive natural phenomenon as a tornado can be deadly and destructive.

Eurocom, known for its productive gaming and professional laptops, has introduced new options for completing the Tornado F5 laptop. Now the device can be equipped with Intel Kaby Lake processors and graphics accelerators based on Pascal GPUs.

Notebook Tornado F5 is equipped with a 15.6-inch display, the resolution of which can be 1920 x 1080 pixels, or 3840 x 2160 pixels with G-Sync support. A laptop was built on a motherboard with an LGA 1151 processor socket based on the "desktop" Intel Z170 chipset, on which Intel Core i7-7700K, Core i7-7700K or Core i5-7600K processors can now be installed. The use of a desktop processor and a conventional processor socket makes it easy to upgrade the laptop configuration.

The discrete graphics card NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080, 1070 or 1060 of the Pascal generation, or GeForce GTX 980M, 970M or 965M of the Maxwell generation is responsible for graphics processing in the new product. Maxwell generation professional graphics cards up to the Quadro M5000M are also available. All video cards are MXM 3.0, so they can also be replaced with a more efficient one if desired.

Note that the laptop is equipped with a powerful cooling system, which includes many heat pipes, two aluminum radiators and two fans. According to the manufacturer, this system cooling even allows you to safely overclock CPUs and GPUs, with overclocking support present in the BIOS and VBIOS.

The Tornado F5 laptop can be equipped with two DDR4 RAM modules with a frequency of up to 3200 MHz and a total capacity of up to 64 GB. The storage subsystem can include up to two M.2 SSDs up to 2TB each and a 2.5-inch hard drive up to 2TB or SSD up to 4TB. There is support for RAID 0 and RAID 1. All this is powered by a battery with a capacity of 75.24 W * H, which, according to the manufacturer, can provide up to 130 minutes of operation.

Notebook Eurocom Tornado F5 is already available for order on the official website of the manufacturer, and its cost in the standard package offered by the manufacturer is $1666 (Core i7-6700K, GeForce GTX 1070, 8 GB of RAM). We managed to "assemble" a configuration costing over $9500, and this is without various additional accessories.

Tornado A rapidly rotating column of air descending from a cumulonimbus cloud or forming under a cumulonimbus cloud is often (but not always) seen as a funnel cloud. To be classified as a tornado, the vortex must come from the cloud and touch the ground. It is known that a tornado can form an invisible funnel.

How do tornadoes form in the US?

The classic answer to this question is: warm, moist air with Gulf of Mexico collides in the United States with cold air from Canada and dry air from the Rocky Mountains. Under such conditions, a large number of thunderstorms occur, which carry the threat of a tornado. The most destructive and deadly tornadoes form under huge cumulonimbus clouds, which in the US are called supersells, these clouds rotate, forming mesocyclones. These clouds often bring large hail, squally winds, severe thunderstorms and downpours, as well as tornadoes.

How many tornadoes occur in the US annually?

Every year, about a thousand tornadoes occur in the United States. It is difficult to say for sure, since some tornadoes occur in sparsely populated areas and therefore are not recorded.

At what time of the year do most tornadoes occur?

Basically, the tornado season lasts from early spring to mid-summer. In some states, tornadoes peak in May, in others in June or even July. But in general, tornadoes can occur at any time of the year.

What is Tornado Alley?

This is the historical name for the central American states that experience the most tornadoes. Nevertheless, tornadoes can occur anywhere: on the west and east coasts of the United States, as well as in Canada and other states.

How long does a tornado last?

A tornado can last from a few minutes to an hour or more. But most of of which there are no more than ten minutes.

How are tornadoes in the northern hemisphere different from tornadoes in the southern hemisphere?

They differ in the direction of rotation. Most tornadoes (but not all!) have a cyclonic rotation, i.e. counterclockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern hemisphere. Anticyclonic tornadoes rotate clockwise in the northern hemisphere. They most often appear in the form of waterspouts, and there are also many cases of simultaneous observation of cyclonic and anticyclonic tornadoes under the same thunderstorm.

What is an F-scale?

The scale for classifying tornadoes was introduced by Professor T. Fujita in 1971. This scale should be used with caution, as tornado wind speeds cannot yet be accurately measured. The damage caused by a tornado depends not only on the speed of the wind, but also on many other factors: the strength of the building, the direction and duration of the wind, the amount of debris flying in the air. However, despite its shortcomings, the Fujita scale is now widely used in the US.

Can category F6 tornadoes be observed?

No, it is unlikely that wind speeds in a tornado will exceed 512 km/h. The F6-F12 tornado categories were introduced for theory rather than practical purposes. Even if Doppler radar measures winds slightly above 512 km/h, the tornado will still be classified as F5.

Is it true that the larger the tornado, the stronger it is?

No, not necessarily. The size of a tornado is no indication of its destructive power. Small tornadoes have been known to do damage like F4 or F5, on the other hand, some very large tornadoes have done little damage: F0 or F1.

Isn't it possible to weaken or destroy a tornado by bombarding the cloud with some kind of reagent, such as solid carbon dioxide?

The main problem is that by acting in this way, you can not only destroy the tornado, but vice versa, make it much more powerful and destructive than it was. In addition, cloud bombardment systems must be deployed very quickly on the ground, and they need a lot of them to cover the entire vast territory over which tornadoes arise. Now imagine the legal problems that could arise if you destroyed someone's private property in the process of bombing clouds. All in all, it's a bad idea!

What does a tornado sound like?

It depends on its size, intensity, distance to it and other factors. Most often, the sound of a tornado is compared to the rumble of a train. Sometimes a tornado makes a sound similar to the sound of a waterfall or the sound that occurs when driving fast with the windows open.

Who predicts tornadoes?

In the United States, tornadoes are forecast by the National Weather Service. Tornado warnings are issued by regional branches of the National Weather Service. The Storm Prediction Center deals with adverse weather events in general. Tornadoes in Canada are predicted by the Canadian Meteorological Service.

Can a tornado carry objects over long distances?

Yes, tornadoes understand the air and carry debris and even heavy objects over distances of up to several kilometers. The vertical component of the wind in a tornado is strong enough to lift even heavy objects into the air, especially if they have a large area, such as a roof, wall, tree, or car. Although very heavy objects can only be carried over short distances. Cases of carrying objects over distances of more than 150 kilometers have been officially recorded.

Why tornadoes avoid centers major cities?

It's all about probability here. It's just that the city center is located on a very small area in comparison with the area of ​​the whole country. Therefore, the likelihood that a tornado will hit the city center is very small. For example, the area of ​​​​the central part of Dallas, only three square miles. However, city centers can also be hit by tornadoes. So in St. Louis, tornadoes in the city center were observed at least four times.

What happens if a tornado hits Big City?

This has happened, and more than once. For example, a tornado in Oklahoma City on May 3, 1999. Thanks to a well-functioning system of warning the population through means mass media only 36 people died that day. But the damage caused exceeded 1 billion dollars. It was the most costly tornado in American history. Moreover, this tornado did not affect the city center.

Which US city is the most affected by tornadoes?

Again, this is Oklahoma City. The total number of tornadoes that have been recorded in this city is over 100.

When was the largest tornado observed?

It originated in Texas on June 9, 1971. From time to time the diameter of the tornado reached three kilometers!!! There may have been other, even larger tornadoes, but they were not recorded.

What is the maximum wind speed a tornado can have?

Nobody knows. Wind speed can only be measured directly in weak tornadoes, because more powerful tornadoes destroy meteorological instruments. The maximum wind speed (about 512 km / h) was remotely measured using a mobile Doppler radar on May 3, 1999 near Oklahoma City.