Weatherman calls deadly early-morning tornado unusual event
Posted on Friday, January 11, 2008
The intensity of a tornado that struck the Ozark foothills on Tuesday, killing a Pope County man, could produce winds up to 135 mph and was unusual in its timing, a meteorologist said Thursday.
John Robinson of the National Weather Service in North Little Rock said the tornado was an Enhanced Fujita (EF ) 2, which can generate winds of 111 mph to 135 mph.
The highest level on the scale is an EF 5.
The tornado moved across a 20. 5-mile path, starting one mile south-southwest of Moreland in south-central Pope County moving into Conway County, and ending 2. 3 miles west of Beverage Town in south-central Van Buren County. All the Van Buren County damage was in the Ozark National Forest and none there appeared structural, Robinson said.
Just outside Appleton in Pope County, the tornado struck a double-wide mobile home about 8: 40 a. m., killing Billy Carter, 61, and injuring his wife, Lydonna Carter.
She remained hospitalized in good condition Thursday.
Robinson said the tornado was unusual in two ways — the time of day and the time of year.
“It’s pretty unusual to have storms that early in the morning,” he said. “Typically, early morning is one of the cooler times of the day.” Add cooler weather to rising pressure at that time of the day and those two factors “tend to work against storms,” he said. Midafternoon to midevening are the peak times for storms, he noted.
Robinson said January historically is one of Arkansas’ slower months for tornadoes. “If you exclude 1999 when we had so many storms that one January, January normally ranks second- or third-lowest of any month for tornadoes in Arkansas,” he said.
The peak month is usually April, he said.
Tracy Farley, the Russellville-based spokesman for the Ozark and Ouachita national forests, said about 300 acres in the Ozark forest had some damage.
Farley said damage was still being assessed and that personnel were out the day after the tornado clearing tree-littered roads with chain saws.
“We saw hundreds and hundreds of trees down” in the forest, Robinson said. “One tree was clearly over 75 years old. It was a pine tree.” Robinson said the weather service issued a tornado warning for all three of the counties “roughly 10 minutes” before Carter was killed. “Six out of our last tornado fatalities have occurred when people are asleep,” he added.
Family members have said Carter, who worked the night shift for the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, was in bed at the time of the tornado.
“People will say, ‘Oh, I’ll watch TV’ for any [storm ] warnings,” Robinson said.
“But if you’re not awake or you don’t have the TV on you don’t know about it” and can’t take precautions. One exception, he said would be if the person has a special weather radio by his bedside.
Robinson said one reason no more people got hurt was that many people had already gone to work or school. The tornado struck just outside Appleton and Jerusalem, a nearby Conway County community, rather than in the heart of either small town.
Robinson said that apparently only severe thunderstorms hit Garland and Saline counties, not a tornado.
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