National US weather service Forecast tornado brushes-The day of the days prior to, and people prepare and how to prepare and when preparing and when preparing it gives clocks and warnings. NWS researchers also carry out another task that is essential: they are essential to do damage surveys, such as Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana this week.
It is so important to know why these surveys of destruction by tornadoes are so important American scientific He talked to Jana Houseel at the State University of Ohio.
(It follows the edited transcript of the conversation.Diagnies
To help Science Journalism
If you enjoy this article, consider entering award-winning journalism Subscribe. By purchasing subscription, you are helping to ensure the future of stories about the discoveries and ideas that are conformed to today.
Why do researchers do damage after a tornado hits?
The biggest reason is to develop a climatic database When tornadoes are happening, where tornadoes occur and how many intense tornadoes are.
With the hurricane, you send a hurricane hunter aircraft in the air, and a drop through the hurricane throws a compulsory package. This tool acquires information about temperature, pressure, wind, humidity, etc., as it is descending. And these wind measurements are what we use to understand the vivid hurricane.
Tornadoes create a challenge because they are very small with this type of technique. They are very lively, and it is very difficult to predict. And nowhere are we not entering an instrument in the first place. So the best way to our disposal is the opportunity to find out how often vivid tornadoes affect.
A lot of people try to argue, “Well, why don’t we use radars, for example, to look at tornadoes?” And the biggest problem in Radars is the distance between the radar and the tornado. Also, where the radar is actually measured in the tornado is not on the ground, it is usually very high. And there is always standard height We can always get information, so we can’t compare apples to apples using radar data.
What is a damaged survey?
When you go to a certain uncertain survey, the first thing we want to do is where the tornado began to create damage first. So you want to set a starting point, which is usually informed, at least the first order invention, according to radar data.
“I’ve seen the vest bits display in concrete sidewalk warranties.” -Jana housing, Researcher Tornado
We have a list of 28 damage indicators, where we have very specific types of buildings and other objects. This will be such a hospital or a house or gas station, awning or a hard tree or a soft tree. Meteorologists have collaborated with civil engineers and windy engineers, using wind tunnels and tornado simulators and all elegant things, actually represent, “how much does the wind accumulate the roof of a house?” So each of these objects has a wind-speed category related to it (improved Fujita (EF) scale: EF1, EF2, EF3, etc. We use what we know about the damage caused to calculate the wind. At the end of the day, we collect various pieces and the assessment assigned to a tornado is based on intense damage to the entire path of the tornado.
Can you tell us some of your experiences with damage surveys?
With these I saw some interesting things and interesting ways. I think some of the most memorable moments after Greensburg, Kan., Tornado May 2007. That was the first EFF of the new EF scale in 2007 (when he replaced the former Fujita scale).
That was my first experience with damage to catastrophic tornadoes. The town was equalized, 90% of the town was removed from the map. The slab was basically the buildings that were naked. There was a fire hydrant, I will never forget this fire hydrant literally sucked from the ground, I do not know at least six foot tubes. And nothing was bent, like, very straight. This speaks with the intensity of vertical winds that take place. You don’t have a horizontal wind in a tornado.
And I saw the road fuck: that is, the tornado basically leaves outside the roads. And I’ve seen straw parts stuck in the concrete warranty of the sidewalks. When you do 200 kilometers of time moving, it has suffered enough to be attached to the side of a rigid word.
If meteorologists cannot immediately make a survey, or can I do photos at all?
It depends in the photo quality matter and the photographers do not know or know the surveys. You know what he is looking for and knows the zoom, such as the connections between the floor and the connections between the Foundation (which should be able to tolerate), you can get a relatively good feeling for damage.
The challenge with the photos is that point sources. You don’t have to guarantee full coverage of the space space if thousands and thousands of photos are not made of different angles.
And of course, not having a deterioration survey was not challenged that the people immediately starts to clean up immediately, with a little sleeping water.
How essential is these surveys always do?
Injury surveys are very important to report our US tornado climatology. If we stop being the ability to get out and really do harm we do consistently, we will throw a complete understanding of what is happening with tornadoes in time.
We could achieve false sense that there are fewer tornadoes, as they do not have a crew that are investigating some of these weak tornadoes. Or, if the offices are pressed during the season, EF may be obtained because we will get the wrong scale rating because they are staff and are limited resources.
Then that brings everyone in the great question they want to know, that is: how do tornadoes change in the world of a changing climate? If we do not have the right facts, we cannot answer this question accurately.
