Why So Many Tornadoes Recently?
- 12 years ago
Are Tornadoes Increasing in Number? - as part of the news and politics series by GeoBeats.
Images from the March 2nd, 2012 tornadoes in Indiana, Kentucky and other states were just heartbreaking. Nearly 20 million people were affected in this outbreak. The Weather Channel mentioned that there were about 100 reports of tornadoes that day, which means this could be the largest March outbreak ever.
Just as shocking, in April 2011, there were 178 tornadoes within a span of 3 days across 16 states.
With such reports and other recent extreme weather activity, it begs the question whether tornado activity is increasing in general?
From a pure anecdotal standpoint, it is easy to jump to that conclusion because we tend to remember more of the recent events but scientists say the answer is much more complex and there's no consensus.
Following the April, 2011 tornadoes, a New York Times article cited a two fold increase in April tornadoes over the last 50 years but most of that is attributed to better data collection.
In 2008, we did witness a higher number of tornadoes than usual in states like Wisconsin as they were experiencing warmer winters, suggesting a possible link between global warming and increased rate in tornadoes.
However, may experts believe recent tornado activity is a normal weather variation and it may be few more years before we determine any link between global warming and rate of tornadoes.
What do you think - are we seeing a permanent increase in frequency of tornadoes?
Images from the March 2nd, 2012 tornadoes in Indiana, Kentucky and other states were just heartbreaking. Nearly 20 million people were affected in this outbreak. The Weather Channel mentioned that there were about 100 reports of tornadoes that day, which means this could be the largest March outbreak ever.
Just as shocking, in April 2011, there were 178 tornadoes within a span of 3 days across 16 states.
With such reports and other recent extreme weather activity, it begs the question whether tornado activity is increasing in general?
From a pure anecdotal standpoint, it is easy to jump to that conclusion because we tend to remember more of the recent events but scientists say the answer is much more complex and there's no consensus.
Following the April, 2011 tornadoes, a New York Times article cited a two fold increase in April tornadoes over the last 50 years but most of that is attributed to better data collection.
In 2008, we did witness a higher number of tornadoes than usual in states like Wisconsin as they were experiencing warmer winters, suggesting a possible link between global warming and increased rate in tornadoes.
However, may experts believe recent tornado activity is a normal weather variation and it may be few more years before we determine any link between global warming and rate of tornadoes.
What do you think - are we seeing a permanent increase in frequency of tornadoes?