How to prepare for and survive a tornado
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Comments (5)
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Robert LarsonContributor - October 14, 2021
Great article as always guys!
It reminded me of your hurricane article and I suppose that many of the same ways to fortify your house for a hurricane can apply to a tornado? Using hurricane ties to secure the rafters of your home, strengthening your garage door, boarding up windows?
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Josh CentersContributor - October 14, 2021
With hurricanes, you get days of warning to board up windows and such. Usually with a tornado you only have minutes to prepare, not even enough time to close shutters. And tornado winds are much stronger than hurricane winds. Hardening your house might help a bit, but it won’t hold up to a direct hit. A better investment would be a concrete shelter, though those are pretty expensive.
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Robert LarsonContributor - October 14, 2021
That makes a lot of sense on how the time you have to bunker down is much shorter with tornados.
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Gideon ParkerStaff - December 13, 2021
Copy and pasting a story from M.E. from another forum post:
I would like to share a tornado story of my own, as I think it could be instructive if someone finds themselves in a tornado warning. Many years ago I was at a business dinner in a very fancy restaurant in a midwest city. I heard the emergency alert on the radio at the bar, and asked the waiter what it said. He said it was a tornado warning and started to go back to work. Everyone in the restaurant kept eating and laughing and chatting as though nothing was happening.
I asked the waiter how to get to the basement and he just pointed to the stairs. I calmly picked up my purse, my dinner, and my drink and started walking to the basement. Everyone stopped and STARED – and then they followed me! Within 3 or 4 minutes everyone was in the basement and having a marvelous time (since they followed my lead and also brought their meals with them). The staff all came downstairs too and we turned it into a party. We were down there for a good 45 minutes before the all clear was sounded.
What is important about this story is that someone had to act first. I’m pretty certain that if I had returned to my dinner, peer pressure would have meant that others would have stayed at the table too (some of the attendees were vendors, and one was my employee). The mere fact that one person headed for the basement – and calmly – made it okay for everyone to do so. And making it okay to bring our meals with us (which I didn’t think through, really – I just did it) – meant the staff didn’t feel they had to take the risk to go upstairs to feed us etc., so everyone was safe.
I was fortunate in that situation that there was a basement available. So sad that many people in this weekend’s storm apparently had nowhere safe to go.
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Gideon ParkerStaff - December 13, 2021
Copy and pasting a story from Mr. Mark from another forum post:
Several years ago my wife and I were in a Home Depot when the tornado siren sounded. The announcement over the PA was to vacate the store! We went to the glass enclosed entrance where a small crowd had gathered, trying to decide whether on not leaving the store was safe. I could already see rotation in the dark skies above so we headed for the restrooms. While concrete walled and undoubtedly the safest locations in the store, they were packed…no room to get any more people in whatsoever. I decided the safest place to be then was in the bathroom section. My wife and I both crawled into separate steel display tubs, using boxed tub-surround kits to cover ourselves. The store was hit, but fortunately only one corner near the garden section and front entrance were damaged. There were trees and shrubs of all kinds scattered everywhere but no one was hurt except for a couple of people who suffered some small cuts because they elected to stay at the entrance and “watch the tornado!” To this day I do not enter a building without first looking for a designated tornado shelter or safest place to be during a tornado.
During a later experience in a WalMart we were told we cold not leave the store, but to lie down in an aisle somewhere! Despite those instructions we headed for what we found were empty bathrooms! Several people were injured by flying debris when the store was hit. My wife and I were injury free.
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