Tornado Tales Ask Dave a weather question

Dave Thurlow, Host

 
Tornadoes are the deadliest of natural wonders -- mysterious, violent, perverse, and awesome. We still don't know exactly how they form or why they tend to rotate only in one direction, and we're lucky to get a half-hour warning of where and when they're going to hit. Hi, I'm Dave Thurlow from the Mount Washington Observatory and this is The Weather Notebook.

The only small imaginary control we have over tornadoes is to talk about them. And so, over the years, we have spun off a rich meteorological genre of survivors' stories, eye-witness accounts, folk tales and superstition. A lot of tornado tales are incredible in both senses of the word, though the tellers will swear they're true. There are stories of twisters cutting people's heads off, ripping away their beards, snatching checkbooks from their pockets. Some folks in tornado alley believe you can attract a tornado just by thinking about it.

But with tornadoes, documented facts are every bit as amazing as fiction. Not long ago in Wichita Falls, Kansas, a man ascended into a funnel cloud when a tornado blew his house to smithereens: as he rose, he could see a house trailer spiraling next to him with one of his neighbors trapped inside. When he regained consciousness he found himself coiled in barbed wire, splinters quilling his body like a porcupine. In 1957, a Dallas, Texas, woman looked out her window during a tornado to see a railroad car somersaulting down the street like an acrobat.

The "awesomeness" of tornadoes is that they really do go beyond our wildest imaginations. But not beyond our powers of narration. Stories -- whether strictly accurate or stretched for effect -- are the best way we know of bringing tornadoes down to our level, containing them, figuring out what they've done in the past. And, let's hope, preparing ourselves for what they're capable of doing in the future.

Thanks to contributing writer David Laskin.