April 03, 2007

Trivial Tuesday

Thirty-three years ago tonight, the largest outbreak of tornadoes on record occurred in the United States and Canada. A total of 148 tornadoes were confirmed between the afternoon of April 3rd and early morning of April 4th, 1974, including seven F5 tornadoes. (For a little perspective, there have been many times when no F5 tornadoes were confirmed for multiple consecutive years.)

This outbreak is important, not only because over 300 people were killed or because of the economic impact the destruction caused, but also because it serves to show the importance of newer forecasting and early warning systems.

With that in mind, here is this week's question: While the other states had higher total death tolls, the deadliest and most devastating single tornado was the first F5 of the day, which struck which state? (Bonus points if you know the town.)

crse is correct. It was Ohio. The first F5 tornado of the outbreak hit Xenia, Ohio, where 32 people were killed and almost half of the buildings in town were damaged or destroyed.

1 comment:

crse said...

Im going to guess ohio. Mostly because i live there and have an extremely vague image. I have no idea what town though