With all the recent weather disasters across the U.S., there is a glimmer of good news.
It’s been 246 days since a person in the U.S. was killed by a tornado, the longest such streak since accurate records began in 1950, according to NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center.
That easily beats the previous record-long streak of 220 days set from June 24, 2012, through Jan. 30, 2013, said Patrick Marsh, a meteorologist at the center.
Long stretches without a single tornado death are becoming more common: All streaks of 200 days or longer have occurred within the past 5 years, Marsh said.
The USA’s most recent deadly tornadoes both hit on May 16, 2017, in Oklahoma and Wisconsin.
As for a reason for the streak, there really isn’t one besides good luck, said Harold Brooks, a tornado researcher with NOAA’s National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Okla.
However, while fewer tornadoes in recent years is one explanation for the lower death toll, it doesn’t tell the whole story, according to the National Weather Service.
“It’s not surprising that the four longest periods on record without a tornado fatality have occurred within the past six years,” said weather service director Louis Uccellini. He said that since the deadly 2011 tornado season — which included the Joplin, Mo., tornado that killed over 150 people — NOAA has made a concerted effort to improve America’s preparedness and response to tornadoes.
“We’ve invested in faster supercomputers and better models to improve our forecasts and warnings,” Uccellini said.
Last year, severe weather became infrequent after May 2017 despite a ferocious start to that year’s tornado season, which killed 35 people. Five of the final seven months of 2017 recorded a below-average number of tornadoes, the Weather Channel said.
Those seven months also did not have a single tornado rated higher than EF2 on the Enhanced Fujita Scale. By far, the strongest tornadoes are the biggest killers: Some 83% of the deaths from 2000-2013 were from tornadoes rated EF3 or stronger, according to data from Greg Forbes of the Weather Channel.
Brooks said there aren’t typically many U.S. tornado deaths after the spring storm season. June through October are typically quiet, he said, before the “second tornado season” of November. But last year, November was quiet, too.
“If we get through November without deaths, we usually have a good shot at a long run without deaths,” he added.
An average of 71 people are killed each year by tornadoes, based on data from 1987-2016, the Weather Channel reported.
Although the official tornado database only goes back to 1950, less complete records from earlier in the century show a streak of 263 days from June 1901 to March 1902, according to Brooks.
Barring a “freak event,” and looking at the predicted weather pattern over the next couple of weeks, we should break that “unofficial” record too, he added.
by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
Published 2:58 p.m. ET Jan. 17, 2018 | Updated 5:11 p.m. ET Jan. 18, 2018
