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Showing posts with the label KAKE

I Wish This Were True

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I wish that were true.  East Wichita suffered a tornado* in September 1992 that was accompanied by a tremendous hailstorm to the north of its path. Our home had 3" hail and needed a new roof. Hail often accompanies the stronger tornadoes.  *The tornado struck a particularly junky area and there was a joke this tornado had "the potential to cause millions of dollars of improvements." As it turned out, it didn't. They rebuilt it as junky as it was before. Sigh. 

The 70th Anniversary of Udall -- The Nightmare of Tornado Alley

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Is there anyone in the Midwest or South that hasn't had a passing thought about a violent tornado occurring in the middle of the night? Seventy years ago Sunday, on May 25, 1955, the people of Udall, Kansas, were awakened by an ungodly roar as an F-5 intensity tornado flattened their town. Eighty-two people died. Earlier, a tornado had struck Blackwell, OK killing another 20. The primitive radar at (now) Oklahoma State University showed the tornado near Udall. Unfortunately, the storm -- between Wichita and Udall -- blotted out the signal from the WWII radar at the Weather Bureau office in Wichita. They mistook what they saw on the radar as the storm weakening. The television stations said, "The threat of severe weather is over." How wrong they were.  This tornado was so powerful that a few people who dashed to their basement drowned.  The tornado toppled the town's water tower.  Wichita's KAKE-TV's (ABC) news special for the 70th anniversary is here .