Tornado warning!

[thewayne]

Today someone sent out a tornado warning to everyone who works for the City.

THE SAFEST PLACE TO BE DURING A TORNADO IS IN A BASEMENT. GET UNDER A
WORKBENCH OR OTHER PIECE OF STURDY FURNITURE. IF NO BASEMENT IS
AVAILABLE...SEEK SHELTER ON THE LOWEST FLOOR OF THE BUILDING IN AN
INTERIOR HALLWAY OR ROOM SUCH AS A CLOSET. USE BLANKETS OR PILLOWS TO
COVER YOUR BODY AND ALWAYS STAY AWAY FROM WINDOWS.

IF IN MOBILE HOMES OR VEHICLES...EVACUATE THEM AND GET INSIDE A
SUBSTANTIAL SHELTER. IF NO SHELTER IS AVAILABLE...LIE FLAT IN THE
NEAREST DITCH OR OTHER LOW SPOT AND COVER YOUR HEAD WITH YOUR HANDS.

OK. Basement is good, I once again work in the basement. I can theoretically crawl under my desk. The entire wall behind me is glass, but there's cork covering a lot of it and a big book case, so I should be relatively safe.

But what's this crap about lying in ditches? WTF? As I recall, tornadoes are frequently accompanied by voluminous quantities of water. We have an amusing little feature here in the southwest: flash floods. I can just picture someone lying in a ditch to avoid a potential tornado and getting killed by a flash flood!

Comments

[ateji.livejournal.com]

Probably ought to call up the National Weather Service on that one, as that's what they say on the Weather Channel and weather.com when we're having tornado warnings.

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

The usual reason for the finding a ditch is that tornadoes have a nasty habit of picking things up and flinging them....including people. Trying to get as low as possible reduces the chance of being picked up. However, in the desert, it does raise some concern about getting buried under fast-moving water or mud.

What a conundrum....

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

"Auntie Em!" or "*Glub*!"

I don't know which way I'd go. ;-) I think I'd probably go for the sight-seeing. But for that matter, my car is 4WD, so I think I'd stand a decent chance of out-running it. They don't move that fast, but I don't know the radius of the accompanying winds.

[deborak]

I think I'd stand a decent chance of out-running it.

It was nice knowin' ya! ;-)

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

If I had to pick one danger or the other, I'd almost be more inclined to pick going airborne. There'd at least be a better view and, depending on how high 'n' far you flew, a better chance of surviving it. Once you're in a flash flood, you're pretty much fucked short of being plucked out by the Hand of God.

[fastlearner.livejournal.com]

You going airborne isn't so much the problem. Rather, it's all the other stuff the tornado picks up and flings at you at 100mph+. Heavy things. Sharp things. Even tiny things can tear your flesh off. Bad juju.

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

Very bad juju indeed! Flensing while flying doesn't sound like much fun!

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

No argument. Given that tornadoes have been known to blow stalks of straw through telephone poles, perforation is definitely a hazard.

Admittedly, if you get picked up and flung at the 100mph+, you might be OK in the air because the relative velocities mean you won't be hit as hard or fast. Of course, landing becomes a very different issue....

[fastlearner.livejournal.com]

Aye, even at only 100mph, the planet hits pretty hard. :)

[personaminor.livejournal.com]

See the thing is that if you're in the a ditch, you have to lie flat in the ditch. If the flood comes...

...duck and cover, baby. It's all about some ducking and some covering. The flood will roll harmlessly over you.

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

Two problems with that. One, there's no air under a flood, and they don't tend to be over all that quick. Two, they tend to be dragging enough heavy shit in them that'll batter the living Hell out of you and drag you along, too. Remember when we were kids and I fell in the runoff on Elm street back in El Paso? If Dad hadn't pulled me out, I'd have been screwed, 'cause I couldn't get up or out and there's no way I could've breathed in that.

[personaminor.livejournal.com]

Ah, but you're forgetting the whole basis of 1950's survival. You can duck and cover away from anything:

Atomic bomb?
No biggie.

Volcano?
Easy as pie.

Earthquake?
Just relax and take it easy.

Ragnarock?
nYARLATHOTEP's got a thousand nothin' on duck and cover.

Domestic dispute?
You got a kitchen table? Take some cover and let the good times roll.

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

Too bad Boromir never learned that.

Or Obi-Wan, for that matter....

Domestic dispute?
You got a kitchen table? Take some cover and let the good times roll.

The only thing they never mentioned with that is having to pray like Hell she doesn't grab the cast-iron frying pan. Those fuckers have the mass and density to be armor-piercing to a battleship! The one consolation to it is that if it hits you through the table, you'll probably never know what happened. On the other hand, appearing to St. Peter with a handle protruding from just above your nose might be a tad on the embarrassing side.

[donkey-hokey.livejournal.com]

I remember when a tornado hit Salt Lake - it was accompanied by one of the nastiest rainstorms I can remember in the 15 years I've lived here.

(Yeah, Salt Lake gets hit by tornadoes. EXTREMELY rare, but yeah.)

[apostate-96.livejournal.com]

We've actually had several hit, but that one was by far the worst. I do recall, though, that the others also had really nasty rain along with them. The scary thing for me is when rain suddenly turns to hail, 'cause that often happens with tornadoes. However, it's not a certain predictor of it, just a possible warning. *twitch*

[quasar273.livejournal.com]

My sister (or was it two of my sisters?) survived a tornado by abandoning the car and getting in a ditch. On the other hand, that was in Ohio. I've driven through potential tornadic weather in very flat portions of Oklahoma and Texas, looking for places to take shelter along the way, and sure enough all the ditches were full of water. I'd guess in NM the sensible thing would be to look for a small depression that ISN'T an arroyo or ditch. Or maybe the lee side of a hill or something. (Imagines being eaten by migrating gypsum dunes) Or maybe not.

Outrunning a tornado (in a car) is theoretically possible, except for that little problem where your car needs a ROAD that happens to be going in a sensible direction. Add in the fact that tornados often travel in packs and it really isn't always easy to see one approaching, and then if you CAN see it you need to watch long enough to tell which way it's moving, and they might follow curved paths -- sometimes hunkering is a better idea than running.

Sounds like you need to watch more Storm Stories.

I, on the other hand, was sitting holding the dog's paw in a flimsily-constructed house reading my email and watching the radar and thinking, 'Tornado warning? Is the NWS nuts? Those aren't tornados.' Which is kind of pitiful on a lot of levels.