... when all hell broke loose, in America's central gulf states.
Records were falling, like so many, pictures on the wall.
And worse yet, the frightful season of severe storms is still churning, blithely along ...
Spring 2011 is setting weather records
by Kimberly Schupp, fox19.com -- Apr 27, 2011
The spring of 2011 is shaping up to be a record-breaking season for weather fatalities. At 45, the number of people who have died from April storms now matches the total number of weather fatalities in 2010.
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"We're not yet to the time of year when these types of tornadoes are most active," said Greg Carbin, forecaster with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) storm prediction center.
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Nationwide, more than 600 tornadoes have been reported in April. That number far exceeds the average number of tornadoes produced during the month, at 163.
During the storm that started April 15, 240 tornadoes were reported in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Illinois, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland.
Last week's fatalities, at 38, had already matched a record set 10 years ago. The record for the most deaths due to tornadoes was set in 1953, at 519.
Thank your lucky stars, if the tornadoes, by-passed your neighborhood ... your home.
Condolences, and godspeed to you and yours, if they didn't ...
... and those "hits" just keep coming ... despite the weary pleas to the contrary.
Tornado count for April off the chart: All-time record for the month
Steve LaNore, Dallas Weather Examiner -- April 27th, 2011
A “normal” April sees 163 tornadoes; the previous record total for April was 267 twisters in 1974.
April of this year has eclipsed the 1974 tornado tally by a long shot. Over 730 tornado reports have been received so far in April.
The stormy nites continued for days on end ... intermixed with Royal nuptial news ... Cheerio America!
Widespread, Dangerous Tornado Outbreak Enters Day Three
Paul Yeager Contributor, aolnews.com -- Apr 27, 2011
Day Three of the tornado outbreak will target a large portion of the eastern U.S. today and tonight, with a risk of tornadoes from New York state southward to the Gulf Coast, including a high risk in portions of Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia.
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(Map shows areas of severe weather risk Wednesday. Image courtesy of NOAA)
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Life-threatening flash flooding is also possible. Heavy rain, up to more than 4 inches, may occur, some of which will fall into water basins already flooding due to extreme rainfall this week and very heavy rainfall during the past month. Numerous flood watches, warnings and advisories have been issued by the National Weather Service.
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The latest tornado outbreak has been a continuation of what has been an extremely active month in terms of severe weather reports, which includes tornadoes, damaging wind and large hail. As of Tuesday afternoon, there had been more than 6,500 reports of severe weather, including 654 tornadoes, in April.
Beware, if you're in the storm's bull-eye.
The hell descending from the sky, can happen, anywhere at anytime, in middle America, in the season of severe storms ...
How a deadly mix of meteorological conditions combine to create a staggering 161 tornadoes in one night
by Daily Mail Reporter , dailymail.co.uk-- 28th April 2011
CNN meteorologist Sean Morris said: 'This could be one of the most devastating tornado outbreaks in the nation's history by the time it's over and several meteorological conditions have combined to create a particularly dangerous mix.'
[Tornado map showing the 161 tornado reports -- 04/27/2011]
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But what is "the cause" of all these broken records ... all these broken lives ...
Is it La Nina? Is it Climate Change kicking in?
Or is it merely better monitoring of tornadic events?
... Inquiring minds should want to know ... so should Inquiring News Media ...
Are La Nina and global warming behind the extreme tornado activity?
by Andrew Freedman, washingtonpost.com -- 2011/04/25
As the world warms, more moisture is evaporated from the oceans into the atmosphere, providing more moisture for storm systems to work with. The likelihood that a warmer atmosphere will also be a wetter one, meaning that it will contain more water vapor, is a robust conclusion of many climate change studies, that also has a firm foundation in physical science.
Both an increase in water vapor and a rise in temperature will boost a metric that meteorologists use to forecast severe thunderstorms, known as Convective Available Potential Energy, or "CAPE." A higher CAPE value indicates that there is more potential energy in the atmosphere to fuel thunderstorm development, should some trigger come along and set them off.
Less tornado-producing wind shear in a warming world?
At the same time, though, modeling studies indicate that a warmer world may also have less wind shear, which is necessary in order to transform ordinary thundershowers into organized squall lines and supercells, capable of dropping large hailstones, producing damaging straight line winds, and spawning tornadoes. So which one will win out?
According to some studies, by the end of the present century, the added water vapor will be enough to overcome the lower wind shear, and create more opportunities for severe thunderstorms to form.
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Long term trends
There is no clear indication that severe thunderstorms and tornadoes have become more common due to climate change, in part because of major limitations in relying on the historical record of severe weather reports. While the number of tornadoes recorded in the U.S. has just about doubled during the past 50 years, the number of strong tornadoes (EF2 and above) has actually been decreasing.
It may be the case that more tornadoes are being noticed today, given a network of trained storm spotters and a national Doppler radar network, both of which didn’t exist as recently as the early 1980s.
It was a dark and stormy nite ... in America ...
When Science was relegated a back seat to speculation and opinions.
When celebrity and gossip ruled the day ...
and cold harsh chaos ... ruled the long stormy nites.
It was a Season of cluelessness, that lasted for far too long ...
for an intelligent and compassionate people ... caught in its flittering whirlwind.