Off Topic

[5B Steve]

  I hope every bus nuts in the southern states are safe for the deadly tornado's today an this evening.

Lets us pray for everyone in those areas.  Moderators, if this is inappropriate please remove.


Steve 5B.......

[Melbo]

Amen

Melbo

[HighTechRedneck]

Well Steve, let's see.  Given that:  I spent the day ducking a repetitive stream of tornado warnings.  Trees in the area started coming down this afternoon knocking the power out and blocking roads.  Across the street from here a large oak tree toppled and blocked Prater Road.  There is an insane amount of damage, injured people, and the death toll across Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee is 72 and rising fast (half an hour ago it was 54).  I am very concerned about quite a few of our local bus nuts.  So I think we'll call it on topic enough.

Around here Ringgold and Trenton got major hits by tornadoes.  Likewise in Tennessee up around Etowah and Athens.  Many other communities also had sightings and damage.  A lot of damage in downtown Chattanooga and East Ridge Tennessee.

Listening to the fire band on the handheld scanner this evening while power was out revealed things are worse than the local news channels were reporting yet.  At that time, one of the local fire depts. had 140 emergency calls reporting trapped people stacked up in their queue.  Fire crews were frustrated because so many trees were down they had problems getting to the calls.  Some simply had to report to dispatch that they couldn't get to there and move on to another call.

One was distraught, it took them two hours of cutting fallen trees and then building debris to get through to one call and when they got there she had just died.  On another one, there was an apartment building hit.  Many injuries and several missing children.  Other calls found injured elderly people.  Some were being transported by fire trucks/rescue squads/police cars because the ambulances were backlogged.

Debris from the Trenton tornado was falling 60 miles away.  The weather radar were occasionally reporting "debris balls" in the clouds.

It is being declared the worst tornado outbreak in the history of the Tennessee Valley.  Even in cases where no tornado formed, ground level wind shears frequently exceeded 100mph.  And all afternoon the storms themselves were moving at 55mph. A couple super cells that came through after dark were moving at over 70mph.

I have a feeling when all is discovered, the death toll will be much higher.

[happycamperbrat]

Im praying for all of you back there! Please take cover

[Oonrahnjay]

Well Steve, let's see.  Given that:  I spent the day ducking a repetitive stream of tornado warnings.  Trees in the area started coming down this afternoon knocking the power out and blocking roads.  Across the street from here a large oak tree toppled and blocked Prater Road.  There is an insane amount of damage, injured people, and the death toll across Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee is 72 and rising fast (half an hour ago it was 54).  I am very concerned about quite a few of our local bus nuts.  So I think we'll call it on topic enough. (snip)
I have a feeling when all is discovered, the death toll will be much higher. 

   Here in eastern North Carolina we had a cluster of tornado and straight-line wind storms about 10 days ago.  There were about 30 fatalities -- also mostly children and elderly people.  I'm a patrol pilot for the NC Forest Service and I spent a good bit of last week surveying the damage.  If you've seen in person what these storms can do and consider the impact on peoples' lives, it's heartbreaking.  Our one good break was that only a few of the tornado hits were in populated areas.  Praying for all you people out there in Alabama, Georgia and Tennesse, too.

[robertglines1]

Finally on back side of it 14.8 inches of rain in 6 days. levy's weak on Ohio and neighbors pulling together to help save each others property. Tornado threat over for us am. My family not in harms way! & no damage. Praying for all our busnut friends and families. 750 tornadoes this month in tornado alley. Helping where and who we can.  Bob & family     Normally live 2 miles from river-now 500 yards( Not a threat to me)

[HighTechRedneck]

So far 27 dead in our local news viewing area and 178 across the South.  Many people still trapped awaiting rescue or bodies recovered.

City of Ringgold (about 8 miles from here) looks to have been severely hit, possibly by an EF5 tornado.  Ringgold is so bad that all roads into it have been closed.  Not even news media is being allowed in past a convenience store at the edge of town.

[Chopper Scott]

The weather this spring has shown us who is in charge. Unbelievable. I know these areas have tornados from time to time but not like this. Living in Nebraska we all have basements. I feel for those that don't have  adequate safe places to go to. The damage an F4 or higher tornado does is incredible.