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Twister Rides The lure of the tornado is only matched by the lore of these storms. Across North America, stories of weird incidents involving tornadic storms have filled accounts in tabloid papers, local histories, newspaper articles and even scientific reports. Many are no more than local lore, tall tales for the campfire or front porch, but many others are well documented phenomena. A majority of these stories involve oddities found in the wake of the storm: plucked chickens, a lamp still lit, a phonograph record embedded in a utility pole, a chicken in a dresser drawer. Others involved tornado-carried objects for long distances: a feather bed found two miles (3.2 km) away, a marriage certificate carried for three miles (five km), a postcard blown 124 miles (200 km), a small refrigerator travelling half a mile (0.8 km). On occasion, reports have surfaced of people caught in the winds and taken for a "twister ride" for some distance before miraculously landing alive. Researchers have often had a difficult time separating the wheat from the chaff in these stories. Renowned tornado researcher Tom Grazulis has studied over 40,000 accounts of American tornadoes and found a number of incidents where people were carried 100-400 yards (metres) to their death, but only one compelling case where a person was carried over a mile, but he died. Grazulis believes the longest confirmed tornado ride without a fatal end came in 1955 when a young girl and her pony flew an estimated 1000 feet (305 m). Matt Suter's Wild RideThat is, before 12 March 2006. On that day, an F2 tornado bore down on the home of Linda Kelley outside Fordland, Missouri. Inside were Kelley, her grandson Matt Suter and his disabled uncle Robert Dewhirst. Suter, a 19-year-old high school student, rose to shut an open window. As he climbed onto a sofa to struggle with the window, a swinging lamp struck him on the head and knocked him unconscious. A instant later, the storm hit the mobile home whisked Suter into the stormy sky. When he landed, softly as he recalls, he was dazed and bleeding. Clad only in a pair of boxer shorts, Suter staggered to his feet, then ran on wobbly legs down the road for help. After being assured that his relatives were okay, Suter sought medical attention for his injury, apparently mentioning his wild ride to only a few. His story came out when a Springfield News-Leader reporter who had heard the tale tracked him down for the details. With the help of a National Weather Service investigator and a GPS unit, the reporter determined that Matt Suter had travelled about 1,307 feet (400 m) from his grandmother's home. If the tornado toss was indeed as long as surmised, Suter would hold the unofficial world distance record for being carried by a tornado and living. Other Twister RidesAs mentioned, there have been many tales of people, including a few babies, who have been carried by tornadoes for long distances. Perhaps some inspired L. Frank Baum, author of the Wizard of Oz to use a Kansas cyclone to transport Dorothy and Toto to the land of Oz. Amidst all the stories of wild tornado rides, Tom Grazulis, in his monumental study of tornado events, believes the most credible instance of a long-distance tornado ride involved a Kickapoo, Kansas farmer who flew about a mile. The event details were carefully measured and documented by the local sheriff. Here in brief is what is known. On 1 May 1930, the Lawrence Kern family had just sat down to dinner when it became apparent that a tornado was approaching the farmhouse. Kern, his wife Augusta and three children ran toward the storm cellar located 30 feet (9 m) from the farmhouse door, but only thirteen year-old John reached the shelter door. Lawrence, his wife and two other children were caught in the storm's fury and blown away with the house. He was found just over a mile (1.6 km) from the house's foundation, buried headfirst in the ground to the shoulders and barely alive. Augusta and her children Whilhemina and Joseph lay about 200 yards (200 m) away from house. Both parents died from their injuries, the two children survived. According to Grazulis in his book The Tornado, the best documented survival of a long-distance toss by tornadic winds occurred in Edmunds County, South Dakota on 1 July 1955. That afternoon, nine year-old Sharon Weron and her pony were returning home from a friend's house near Bowdle while her mother and Sharon's siblings followed in the family car. Sharon had just left the road to cut across the field toward home when, about 150 feet (46 m) from the house, a tornado suddenly appeared. The frightened pony wheeled and took off away from the storm, but the twister caught them as they ascended a small hill and lifted horse and rider into the air. Sharon's mother saw them become airborne. How long Sharon and her horse remained airborne is unknown, as her mother lost sight of them in the accompanying hail. Sharon later remarked that the landing was "just like a plane...on [her] tummy." Miraculously, she was uninjured by her flight, though she did suffer injury from the falling hail while she lay in a ditch. By an odd coincidence, the incident occurred only a few miles from the former Aberdeen home of Oz creator, L. Frank Baum. Randy Cerveny and Joseph T. Schaefer in a piece entitled "Tornado Oddities" published in Weatherwise magazine in 2002, reported a few other instances of humans being carried by a tornado and surviving. The first happened in St. Louis, Missouri on 29 September 1927. As a tornado destroyed a bakery, an automobile mechanic watching from across the street saw a young girl fly out of its cracked walls. The three-year-old was later found uninjured lying in a vacant lot several blocks away. A tornado struck Higgins, Texas on 9 April 1947. (Cerveny and Schaefer reported this as occurring at Higgensville, but I can find no record of a so-named Texas town.) As the storm demolished one house, it lofted two men, known only as Bill and Al, into the tumult. Al went first, caught as he opened the door to see what was causing all the noise. When Bill went to see what had happened to Al, he too was sent sailing. Both landed about 200 feet from the house, and both were uninjured although Bill had been entangled in wire. Al extricated his friend and they headed back to what was left of the house. Only the floor remained but on it, the storm had left two pieces of furniture. A floor lamp and a sofa with Al's wife and two children huddled thereon. The final US incident occurred in 1955 when an F5 tornado hit Udall, Kansas on 25 May. The tornado killed or injured over half the town's population. Two, Fred Dye and Harry Norris, were not counted among the casualties; they were among the luckiest. The twister sucked Dye right out of his home — and his shoes — and deposited in a nearby tree. Norris, was caught asleep in bed and blown through a window into the street. The story reports he slept through the trip. One of the more intriguing stories comes from Canadian climatologist David Phillips. He reports that a tornado snatched a baby girl from her buggy in Uren, Saskatchewan in 1923. A frantic search lasting ten hours ended when the infant was found asleep and unharmed in a shack two miles away. True or only Prairie legend? Learn More From These Relevant Books
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