It's a Twister! It's a Twister!

I find tornadoes utterly fascinating. I expect that it all started with The Wizard of Oz; the 1939 version of course! I watched that movie a lot when I was young; I still watch it. When my sister and I were kids I remember her being freaked out when Dorothy sees Miss Almira Gulch turn into the Wicked Witch while in the twister. This was always my favorite part of the movie.

Then when I was about twelve the movie Twister was released. I fell in love with both the movie and tornadoes in general. There is a certain destructive beauty in these swirling columns of air, dust and debris.

We Got Cows
Twister — MOVIECLIPS.com

Since tornado season is starting I thought now would be a great time to post about these potentially devastating acts of nature.

Once again Climate Central has proven to be a wonderful resource. Here is a short video provided on the organization's webpage: Extreme Weather 101: Tornadoes | Climate Central. Unfortunately, I could not embed the video into this post and couldn't find it on YouTube. I encourage you to check it out though!

I also found an interesting article on Climate Central by Urooj Raja, a research analyst for the organization. Her article What the 2013 Tornado Season Has in Store for the U.S. provides a look into this coming year and helps to explain some of the recent tornado trends.

Two years ago, 2011, had a record number of storms and was very deadly, but then 2012 had much fewer, and less deadly, storms. It seems the drought suffered by states that see high tornado activity helped to suppress the formation of the twisters. Tornadoes spawn from storms, and storms need precipitation. High temperatures and drought means less moisture in the air, so fewer storms. Some areas appear to still have drought conditions, so it is possible that these areas will see decreased tornado activity this season as well.

She also introduces a tornado tracker in her article! How fun!! When you go to the website there is a map and a place to select a date. You can see tornadoes that were confirmed that day, or go back and look for past activity.

Raja brought up one other point that I thought was interesting. She stated that there is no consensus on whether or not climate change is affecting tornadoes. The thought is that since the increased temperatures leads to more moisture in the air that there will be more storms. But, Raja also says that wind shear, which is essential for tornadoes may decrease. So, while there may be more storms due to the moisture in the air, we may see less tornado formation because of the decreased wind shear.

It will be interesting to see what happens this year with tornadoes. We will definitely be coming back to this toward the end of the season to see what occurred and what the experts are now saying.