The Weather Notebook: Year In Tornados

Year In Tornados
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In any other country, a thousand tornadoes in one year would be a catastrophe. But in the United States, that's just below-average, but that's how many tornadoes were tallied in 2001.

Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton and this is The Weather Notebook.

The preliminary tornado count for the nation in late November was just under 1000. That's considerably less than the average in recent years of more than 1100. And there's more good news. The US death toll for the period was still fewer than 40. That's below the pace in each of the previous four years. The winter of 2001 actually saw more tornado deaths than the springtime did. Eight people died in a twister that struck Pontotoc, Mississippi, on February 24. Perhaps the most publicized tornado of the year was the one that swept across the University of Maryland on September 24. As a whole the nation had an unspectacular year of tornadoes. Still, Minnesota saw 72 twisters, the most ever recorded there in a single year. Thanks to good warnings and good fortune, nobody in Minnesota was killed, and the state saw only 13 injuries.

What will happen in 2002? Obviously, it's hard to know. The peak season begins usually in March but, tornadoes occur even earlier. Last year the Weather Service received four reports of tornadoes on January 4th.

If you are interested in more historical data and some really cool pictures, go to NOAA's storm prediction website. The address is: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/.

Thanks today to writer Bob Henson of Boulder, Colorado. The Weather Notebook is a production of the Mount Washington Observatory and is supported in part by the National Science Foundation. As always, we appreciate the efforts of our whirlwind producer, Margaret Landsman.