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| Tornadoes can kill, and the Tri-State tornado was the deadliest of them all | Tornadoes can kill, and the Tri-State tornado was the deadliest of them all |
| (8 days later) | |
| Terrible as it was, the monstrous tornado that tore through Moore, Oklahoma, on Monday, razing whole neighbourhoods, destroying a primary school and killing at least 24 people, was not the deadliest twister the US has experienced. That tragic honour goes to the so-called Great Tri-State Tornado, which, on 18 March 1925, roared across south-east Missouri, southern Illinois and south-west Indiana, devouring all in its path. | Terrible as it was, the monstrous tornado that tore through Moore, Oklahoma, on Monday, razing whole neighbourhoods, destroying a primary school and killing at least 24 people, was not the deadliest twister the US has experienced. That tragic honour goes to the so-called Great Tri-State Tornado, which, on 18 March 1925, roared across south-east Missouri, southern Illinois and south-west Indiana, devouring all in its path. |
| Starting at about 1pm northwest of Ellington, Missouri, the tornado finally dissipated near Princeton, Indiana, some three and a half hours and 220 miles later. Along the way, its nearly one mile-wide front, moving at speeds of up to 73mph and accompanied by winds put at over 300mph, destroyed more than 15,000 homes, leaving 2,027 people injured – and 695 dead. | Starting at about 1pm northwest of Ellington, Missouri, the tornado finally dissipated near Princeton, Indiana, some three and a half hours and 220 miles later. Along the way, its nearly one mile-wide front, moving at speeds of up to 73mph and accompanied by winds put at over 300mph, destroyed more than 15,000 homes, leaving 2,027 people injured – and 695 dead. |
| No tornado in US history has killed more people in a single town (234 in Murphysboro, Illinois), or in a single school: 33 at De Soto, Illinois (17 more children died at Longfellow School, Murphysboro; in all, the Tri-State Tornado killed 69 children in nine schools). Illinois bore the brunt: almost the entire town of Gorham demolished; 541 people killed and 1,423 injured in barely 40 minutes as the tornado swept through Murphysboro, De Soto, Hurst-Bush and West Frankfort. The small town of Parrish, where 22 people died, was one of four communities effectively wiped from the map. The total damage was estimated at $16.5m; maybe $1.5bn today. | No tornado in US history has killed more people in a single town (234 in Murphysboro, Illinois), or in a single school: 33 at De Soto, Illinois (17 more children died at Longfellow School, Murphysboro; in all, the Tri-State Tornado killed 69 children in nine schools). Illinois bore the brunt: almost the entire town of Gorham demolished; 541 people killed and 1,423 injured in barely 40 minutes as the tornado swept through Murphysboro, De Soto, Hurst-Bush and West Frankfort. The small town of Parrish, where 22 people died, was one of four communities effectively wiped from the map. The total damage was estimated at $16.5m; maybe $1.5bn today. |
| Long before the invention of radar and accurate tornado warnings, with even radio still in its infancy, the Tri-State Tornado must have been all the more terrifying. Even farmers with long experience of such extreme weather events seem to have been taken by surprise, partly perhaps because of its unusual appearance: the tornado's vast size, and the very low clouds of its parent thunderstorm, led some survivors to describe it as more of a "rolling fog" or a "boiling cloud", without a tornado's recognisable funnel. | Long before the invention of radar and accurate tornado warnings, with even radio still in its infancy, the Tri-State Tornado must have been all the more terrifying. Even farmers with long experience of such extreme weather events seem to have been taken by surprise, partly perhaps because of its unusual appearance: the tornado's vast size, and the very low clouds of its parent thunderstorm, led some survivors to describe it as more of a "rolling fog" or a "boiling cloud", without a tornado's recognisable funnel. |
| Contemporary accounts still convey the horror. A Gorham schoolgirl told the St Louis Post-Dispatch that as the twister struck her school, "the walls seemed to fall in, all around us. Then the floor at one end of the building gave way. We all slipped or slid in that direction. I can't tell you what happened then. I can't describe it. I can't bear to think about it. Children all around me were cut and bleeding. They cried and screamed. It was something awful. I had to close my eyes …" | Contemporary accounts still convey the horror. A Gorham schoolgirl told the St Louis Post-Dispatch that as the twister struck her school, "the walls seemed to fall in, all around us. Then the floor at one end of the building gave way. We all slipped or slid in that direction. I can't tell you what happened then. I can't describe it. I can't bear to think about it. Children all around me were cut and bleeding. They cried and screamed. It was something awful. I had to close my eyes …" |
| The air, the paper reported, "was suddenly filled with 10,000 things. Boards, poles, cans, garments, stoves, whole sides of the little frame houses, in some cases the houses themselves, picked up and smashed to earth. A baby blown from its mother's arms. A cow, picked up by the wind, hurled into the village restaurant." In the aftermath, the paper described "scenes of suffering and horror", and a destruction "so complete … that people could only guess at where they once had lived". | The air, the paper reported, "was suddenly filled with 10,000 things. Boards, poles, cans, garments, stoves, whole sides of the little frame houses, in some cases the houses themselves, picked up and smashed to earth. A baby blown from its mother's arms. A cow, picked up by the wind, hurled into the village restaurant." In the aftermath, the paper described "scenes of suffering and horror", and a destruction "so complete … that people could only guess at where they once had lived". |
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