Brief tornado warning in Sacramento!

[mermaidwannabe]

Yes, Sacramento, California! I saw it on the Weather Channel. A brief tornado warning, even out there, where tornadoes are virtually unheard of! They have earthquakes, instead!

The warning was cancelled without incident, but they showed the wall cloud, and it did look ominous. Part of it was starting to hang down as though it was going to form a funnel, which fortunately never materialized.

The worst California ever gets along that line are waterspouts, which are really just weak tornadoes out in the ocean that take up a lot of water in them and rarely come to shore. One did once, and overturned a bunch of boats in the harbor, then died down.

Vancourver, Washington gets something like that nearly every year, always very weak, with the exception of 1972 when they had a really bad one -- an EF3 -- that killed six people.

The weather is crazy all over this country! Massachusetts is have a horrible time, right now!

Where and when is all of this going to END?

-- mermaidwannabe

[mermaidwannabe]

The warnings are on again, in three northern California counties around Sacramento! Apparently, that weather system is feeding into the one now developing in the more westerly plains states (Nebraska, New Mexico, Colorado). Not only is the northeast being affected, but now the southwest, as well! And this is an area where, if they get anything, it's just piddling little dust devils.

And I've just heard on the weather channel that a few days ago they tracked an actual tornado in the Sacramento valley area. Didn't say if it amounted to much, but it was there.

Very, very unusual for that part of the country. Just hope nothing further develops from those warnings ...

-- mermaid

[Northernguy]

We get warnings here once in a while as well.A tornado has never hit this area before mostly because of all the tall hills.We do get micro bursts here.Just as deadly but it blows straight down and affects a smaller more concentrated area.
It doesn't mean it can't happen with the perfect circumstances.

[SmokeyCFH]

I remember having several in the last few years, check this out...its a trip. http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=...&cop=&ei=UTF-8

apparently one touched down in chico a few days ago or something.

[mermaidwannabe]

I saw the listing which your link directed me to of California tornadoes from the 1890s through 2000. None were any stronger than F2, and no fatalities were listed. The greatest number of injuries were 30 in Los Angeles County from and F2, back in 1982. I can see why, because that is a more populated area.

The reason most of us Californians and ex-Californians aren't even aware of most tornadoes that have hit in California is because most of them hit unpopulated areas where few people, or no people, live.

And I'll bet some of those were waterspouts that came ashore.

I used to live in Oceanside, California, and I recall hearing about one of those waterspouts that ripped through the marina, there. Did a lot of damage to the boats that were moored.

These are fairly weak tornadoes, not at all like the huge F3s, F4s or F5s that tear through Tornado Alley every year, and which have been really, really bad this year.

It's rare to have a really strong tornado in California, and because so many hit sparsely populated areas, we don't hear much about them, if anything.

That one in Vancouver, Washington in 1972 that killed 6 people was rated an F3. It struck a shopping mall full of people, which made it deadly.

California is much more prone to deadly earthquakes, as so many faultlines run through the state. Including the San Andreas fault. So, if there's an earthquake there, don't blame anyone but San Andreas. It's her fault!

Last I heard, they were rating that Springfield, MA tornado an F2 and quite possibly stronger. The amount of damage looks like at least an F3. And they had TWO of them rip through!

An unprecedented tornado season this year -- probably the worst in this country's recorded history. Hope this isn't just the tip of the iceberg ....

-- mermaid

[SmokeyCFH]

Yeah at this point, owning aquariums, earthquakes terrify me. The last one decent one we had on Easter was pretty sweet, then I realized I have fish tanks and I bolted in there. Thankfully that day I didn't fill them up like I planned on haha

[mermaidwannabe]

Another reason California normally doesn't have really strong tornadoes is that the weather patterns out there are a lot milder. California is famous for generally having much milder climate than other areas of the country. When I lived there, in the southern part, I noticed we never had definite seasons. Heat waves in the middle of January weren't at all rare. Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall just kind of melded into one another without much difference. It might get slightly cooler in the winter months, but it could just as well stay as warm as any other months of the year. Our growing season was all year around. I loved that, and being a native, was accustomed to that throughout my entire life there.

When I moved up here to the inland northwest, it was quite an adjustment to suddenly experience that I can only have a garden for three or, if we're very lucky, maybe four months out of the year, and the rest of the time the ground is covered with snow. It took a long time to grow conditioned to that. And to the fact that on some days, I might not be able to get out of our driveway due to heavy snowfall. One might call that "climate shock". It's like culture shock or future shock, but concerns drastically different weather conditions than one is used to dealing with. After living up here for over a decade, I'm finally used to it and while it tends to get old for everyone after awhile, it has become more-or-less par for the course. That's the way it is, so we adjust our lifestyles accordingly.

As for our aquariums, I doubt they would fare much better in a tornado than in an earthquake. Those of us living near streams or rivers might find our fish being carried by the winds from their closed system in our homes to the open waters out in nature. Those could be the luckier ones.

-- mermaid