Cause And Effect Of Tornado Essay

On May 10th of 2010, a series of tornadoes swept across Oklahoma. The tornadoes continued to form and persist until a couple days later when the severe weather finally abated. This event caused damage to over 500 homes and injured at least 450 people. Three people lost their lives. The outbreak caused an estimated $595 million in damages. The U.S.A. is home to 75% of the world’s tornadoes, with about 800 per year. Of these, many happen in the stretch from the Midwest to the Great Lakes, nicknamed Tornado Alley. Tornadoes cause about 60 deaths yearly, and cause millions of dollars of damage. “Over the 14 years from 2000 to 2013, U.S. insurers paid almost 9 million claims for hail losses, totaling more than $54 billion” according to Verisk Insurance Solutions. The damage that tornadoes can cause includes: flying debris, tearing homes to shreds, causing automobiles to become airborne, and stripping asphalt from the ground. The most dangerous part of all this for humans is flying or falling debris. Tornadoes most often form within supercells . Supercells are the biggest tornado creator, producing almost all major tornadoes. Huge updrafts at excess of 100 mph, in conjunction with tilt and wind shear, begin to feed a …show more content…
They can be 50 to 800 meters in width with horizontal wind speeds anywhere from 40-280 mph. According to the University of Utah, U.S. tornadoes average at around 500 feet across with an average total travel length.of about 5 miles. Tornadoes usually have brief lifespans, lasting only a couple minutes. Their color depends on the debris they pick up; typically, the more debris, the blacker the tornado. The average path taken by tornadoes in the U.S. is usually a steady move towards the Northeast, at a speed of about 30 mph. Tornadoes occur most often during the spring, in the months of May to June. Doppler radar is used to locate mesocyclones, which can be seen as a hook