[quote=Primeinator;143234]I live in the middle of Tornado Alley in the United States. Tornado watches and warnings are very common. We have some unbelievable weather here, and a high respect for mother nature.[/quote]
I've tried to make this point to Paul before:smile:
Ernst suggested a thread devoted to natural catastophes
rarely fatal in the UK. (We had a noticeable earthquake within
the last year). Don't know when we witnessed a volcano though.

David

The picture seen here: [url]http://www.girljournalist.com/wp-content/greensburg_tornado.png[/url] is of the Greensburg tornado that completely wiped out a town here in Kansas May of 2007. It was 1.5 miles at the base (2.4 km or 2,400 meters).

[url]http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/weather/article5134406.ece[/url] describes this one as a "freak". Fair description; they're not very common at this time of year.

Paul

Tornado hits Cincinnati
 

[url]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12100240[/url]

Paul

St Louis airport
 

Another one hits the news.

[url]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13182348[/url]

Paul

About 5 years ago, in the Charlottesville, VA (actually Scottsville, about 17 miles south) area, I came home one day to the ground carpeted with green leaves. A few days later, 2-1/2 miles or so down my road, I noticed a 4 or 5-foot diameter tree with a greenstick fracture of the trunk.
Makes me want to think about building that super-reinforced bathroom in my house.

Had another tornado-like experience tonight, took a *long* time to get home. There's a road (VA 53) that passes through the saddle between Monticello and Carter's Mountain, and, just below that saddle there were half a dozen trees across the road within 100 yards, probably felled about 7PM, with minor damage elsewhere. We had pea-sized hail a few miles away in town.

The long time around was because the alternate route to the south (Route 20) also had a blockage, still not cleared at approximately 10PM tonight.

[url]http://ca.news.yahoo.com/death-toll-mounts-storms-rip-central-us-030655026.html[/url]

I think this describes what we ( humans) are up against quite well.

[QUOTE=Primeinator;143234]I live in the middle of Tornado Alley in the United States. Tornado watches and warnings are very common. We have some unbelievable weather here, and a high respect for mother nature.[/QUOTE]

[URL="http://mersenneforum.org/showpost.php?p=241478&postcount=5"]remember[/URL] ..

Non-UK people may not be aware that we are presently suffering the wettest drought on record. According to one report (which I don't take seriously, given that it appeared in [i]Private Eye[/i]) claimed that crack teams of frogmen were being sent in to Surrey to enforce the hosepipe ban.

Anyway, the Beeb has a video of some of the interesting weather we've seen in the last day or so. A Lincolnshire tornado makes its appearance at the 1:43 mark.

[url]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18639312[/url]


Paul

If we are making this the natural catastrophes thread, wildfires (plural) in Colorado are approaching my home state...we also had an [URL="http://www.google.com/imgres?q=kansas+earthquake+2011&um=1&hl=en&biw=1024&bih=619&tbm=isch&tbnid=cRdyL0nnPJp3RM:&imgrefurl=http://www.sunrisewithcoffee.com/uncategorized/our-kansas-earthquake&docid=khOgS9NLU4KzkM&imgurl=http://www.sunrisewithcoffee.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Kansas-Earthquake.jpg&w=526&h=338&ei=SbjtT8C-LqHa0QHktJHMDQ&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=87&vpy=153&dur=2367&hovh=180&hovw=280&tx=159&ty=204&sig=115137818162980131629&page=1&tbnh=128&tbnw=173&start=0&ndsp=16&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:72"]earthquake[/URL] last year.