{"id":49,"date":"2021-11-05T00:17:20","date_gmt":"2021-11-05T00:17:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/?p=49"},"modified":"2023-10-28T00:29:08","modified_gmt":"2023-10-28T00:29:08","slug":"tornado-alley-is-shifting-eastward-and-were-not-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/2021\/11\/05\/tornado-alley-is-shifting-eastward-and-were-not-ready\/","title":{"rendered":"Tornado Alley is Shifting Eastward\u2014and We&#8217;re Not Ready"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Season 1 \u2022 Episode 4<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Tornadoes are nasty and dangerous. They appear and disappear so fast, there\u2019s usually no time for evacuation\u2014and the United States gets 75% of all the world\u2019s tornadoes, about 1,300 of them a year. They occur all year \u2018round, in all 50 states, but the biggest swarm forms in Tornado Alley, in the southern Plains states like Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. In 2018, storm chaser and meteorologist Victor Gensini made a startling discovery: Tornado Alley has been shifting eastward. Their growing frequency in Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee is a deadly development, because more people live in these areas, often in flimsy housing. And because there are more trees and buildings, it\u2019s much harder to see the devastation coming.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Guest: Victor Gensini, storm chaser and meteorology professor at Northern Illinois University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Episode transcript<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Intro<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Theme begins.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the climate-change era, the disasters you hear about most often are wildfires and hurricanes. And droughts. OK, and flooding.&nbsp;<em>Tornadoes<\/em>&nbsp;don\u2019t get as much love. But maybe they should.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;I think they\u2019re the sexiest of all hazards.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Victor Gensini is a meteorologist and professor, but above all, a storm chaser. And in 2018, he published a paper that freaked out a lot of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;Everyone was up in arms, and I had like 500 media requests overnight.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m David Pogue, and this is \u201cUnsung Science.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[Break]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Season 1 Episode 4: Tornado Alley is shifting eastward, and we\u2019re not ready<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The United States gets 75% of all the world\u2019s tornadoes\u2014about 1300 of them a year. But I\u2019ve never seen one live, and the odds are pretty<em>&nbsp;<\/em>good that you haven\u2019t either. So when you ask most people to picture a tornado, they picture scenes from tornado&nbsp;<em>movies.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>If you\u2019ve never seen a tornado before, your perception of tornadoes was created by Hollywood. And if you look at all the movie covers, \u201cTwister\u201d included, they all have this elephant trunk, high-visible tornado doing damage, people running away from it. Right? A very slender elephant trunk style tornado, high contrast, very visible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Meet Victor Gensini. He\u2019s a professor of meteorology at Northern Illinois University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>In reality, you can see tornadoes that are miles wide. They\u2019re hard to distinguish what\u2019s cloud based, what\u2019s the surface. They\u2019re very low-contrast. Sometimes they\u2019re happening at night. Sometimes they\u2019re happening downtown Atlanta, Georgia. There are nothing like this beautiful, majestic, just-moving-through-a-wheat-field, \u201cWizard of Oz\u201d tornado.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[FILM CLIP Wizard of Oz: \u201cIt\u2019s a twister, it\u2019s a twister!\u201d<\/em>]&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Gensini may identify as a college professor. But he only got into teaching because the job would accommodate his first love\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>The major event that got me into meteorology was when a tornado hit my high school. And I was on a path for engineering and then, like, put the brakes on real quick the next day and said, \u201cNope, nope, nope, I need to find out more about this atmospheric science stuff.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then, you start to poke around what careers are out there, right? Forecaster, broadcast television meteorologists, so on and so forth. And the professor gig is great, because I get to share my love of meteorology with students. But most importantly, I get to perform whatever kind of research that I think is important to help move our field forward.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And by \u201cresearch,\u201d what he means is\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;I storm chase. I drive 10 to 20,000 miles every year across the Great Plains looking for these storms. I don\u2019t like to see destruction. I like to watch storms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I love the landscape. I love the people. Lots of those areas, you know, are\u2014they\u2019ve been untouched since the Homestead Act in the 1930s. I mean, you drive through towns like Boise City, Oklahoma, that still look like, you know, they are a relic of the Dust Bowl in the 1930s.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Are you able to describe verbally what these storms sound like when you\u2019re chasing?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>A lot of people say a freight train like, you know, this huge truck driving through my living room. To me, the best analogy that I can give you is standing in front of a massive waterfall like Niagara Falls in that whooshing sound that you hear, almost a\u2014[blowing noises].&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Is it a lot of sitting around? I mean, you can\u2019t schedule this.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Oh. Oh, my gosh. People don\u2019t understand what storm chasing is. Storm chasing is 99.9% driving in a vehicle. So you got to be around people that can make conversation, make you laugh. You get along, you tell stories, you listen to music, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then that\u2014you know, that tiny point one percent is what you go for, you know. And sometimes they\u2019re great storms, but they don\u2019t produce tornadoes. We\u2019re just looking for the majestic supercells, the beautiful pictures that you see sort of behind me on the wall, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, obviously, this is a podcast, so you can\u2019t see what he\u2019s talking about;&nbsp;<em>I<\/em>&nbsp;was talking to him on a Zoom call. But they were blowups of stunning supercells: these massive, MASSIVE cylindrical cloud formations, towering up to the heavens.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Those, those are what we care about. When you get to see things like tornadoes, it\u2019s just kind of icing on the cake.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And, you know, there\u2019s always something to photograph. Even if it\u2019s not a beautiful tornado in a wheat field, there are still things\u2014skyscapes, sunsets, lightning storms, you know. Old \u201856 Chevies laying in the middle of a field, right, that are rusted out\u2014and there\u2019s always kind of cool landscapes to take in, and that\u2019s I think what all of us are in it for the most, is just to be out there with nature.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Oh, so you\u2019re not tornado chasing\u2014you are just storm chasing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>That\u2019s the key. I think people don\u2019t know the difference, right?&nbsp; I\u2019m really out there just to see thunderstorms. I love photographing. And, you know, it makes me a better scientist because I get to visually see these storms up close versus trying to model them inside of a computer. It makes me certainly a better forecaster, a better researcher.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, it was news to me that storm chasers aren\u2019t really tornado chasers. I mean, that\u2019s definitely not the impression you get from watching \u201cTwister,\u201d the 1996 movie&nbsp;<em>about&nbsp;<\/em>storm chasers.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Twister movie clip]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>ACTOR:<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>I got it! Let\u2019s go, move!\u2026Debris! We have debris!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yep, that was the tornado movie with the flying livestock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>HUNT:<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Cow!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>COW:<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Moo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>HUNT:<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Another cow!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>BILL:<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Actually, I think that was the same one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I think scientifically, you know, those movies are generally very inaccurate. I think they\u2019re good in that they spark interest in STEM fields in general. I know a lot of people at atmospheric science that got interested in meteorology from the movie \u201cTwister,\u201d despite all of its fallacies and so on. But, you know, they\u2019re not peer-reviewed.They\u2019re not science, they\u2019re just entertainment. They\u2019re just Hollywood.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yeah, well, I wanted to run a line from&nbsp;<em>Twister<\/em>&nbsp;by you that is made to sound like pseudoscientific jargon.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Sure.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>So Helen Hunt says:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Hunt<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong><em>[from the movie\u201cTwister\u201d]:&nbsp;<\/em>\u201cLooks like the dry line has stalled. Give me a sector scan west, northwest, look at mid-levels for rotation and increase the PRF.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I love that line. There\u2019s some credibility to that. If the dry line has stalled, there\u2019s probably strong convergence along the dry line, which means that storms are likely initiating. So when she says \u2018west, northwest,\u2019 that would be a preferred area if you were a storm chaser.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>And how about \u2018increase the PRF\u2019?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Oh, yeah, \u2018increase the PRF\u2019 would be the pulse range. You\u2019re increasing the amount of the pulses that are being sent out by the radar.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think Jan de Bont went to, right, those, those scientific writers and said, \u201cif I were a storm chaser, you know, what would I say if I was all excited about storms developing?\u201d&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Wow. What do you do when you go storm chasing?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I do some scientific measurements, right? I will launch weather balloons. We\u2019ll take measurements of the near surface and upper level pressure, temperature, dew point, wind speed, right, all these all these variables that meteorologists care about. But we\u2019re at a very, very safe distance from the storm. And even when I\u2019m actually chasing, trying to get, quote unquote, close, I don\u2019t get into what\u2019s called the bear\u2014bear\u2019s cage of the storm, or in fact, I think Dusty\u2014Seymour Hoffman, in that movie, right, talks about it. \u201cThey\u2019re in the Bear\u2019s cage! You could really feel it with a telephoto lens,\u201d right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Bear\u2019s cage \u201cTwister\u201d clip]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Hoffman<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>They\u2019re in the Bear\u2019s cage! Take a peek! You Can really feel it with a telephoto lens!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Melissa<\/strong>&nbsp;No!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just a side note here: I can\u2019t tell you how much I love that Victor Gensini has the dialogue from \u201cTwister\u201d memorized. Anyway, going on\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>We\u2019re never that close. It\u2019s really scientifically uninteresting when you\u2019re up in there in the tornado, because you can\u2019t see anything! There\u2019s so much rain and dust swirling. The real\u2014the real beauty, honestly, is, you know, several miles away from the storm, kind of taking in the entire, you know, majestic skyscape that these supercells can produce.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It seems like in the climate change era, all we hear about is hurricanes, hurricanes, hurricanes. Do you consider tornadoes underappreciated?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I think they\u2019re the sexiest of all hazards. I think the appeal of the tornado is its short lifespan. It comes and goes very quickly, versus a hurricane. In addition, the damage right after tornadoes is often a little bit more impressive than hurricane damage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, I\u2019ve seen tornadoes remove homes from foundation and put them in the neighbor\u2019s yard. I\u2019ve seen a smart car thrown three hundred and fifty yards, smashed up like a soda can, vehicles flipped over, roofs torn off, right, houses, well-built homes completely removed from the foundation. And the only thing that is remaining are bolts that are being pulled out of the concrete.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, so these are\u2014you talk about forces that are required to do that. Remarkable, remarkable forces that must be required to do that.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I mean, hurricanes and tornadoes are both huge rotating masses of air. Right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yeah, hurricanes are different in that they\u2019re much, much larger than tornadoes. I mean, tornadoes, many of them are a couple hundred yards wide, okay? They last for maybe on the order of minutes, if you\u2019re lucky.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hurricanes are things that last days, sometimes weeks, and they have tropical origin to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But at the end of the day, they\u2019re both doing the same thing. The thunderstorm and tornado itself is an energy transfer mechanism. It\u2019s trying to take stored, pent-up energy, heat and humidity near the surface, and transport aloft. The hurricane is trying to do the same thing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the end of the day, extreme weather is just an energy transfer mechanism. And that\u2019s\u2014that\u2019s the idea of climate change, right, is that these storms are getting more intense because there\u2019s more of an energy imbalance where the temperatures are warmer, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Why is it that the United States leads the world in tornadoes?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It\u2019s our geography. We have a north-south oriented mountain chain to our west, the Rocky Mountains\u2014that\u2019s generally where you\u2019ll see a hotspot of tornado activity just downwind. They do happen other places. But U.S. is very, very unique because we have that north-south oriented mountain chain. But we also have easy access to humidity, moisture, and that\u2019s the Gulf of Mexico.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[music]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know\u2026I\u2019ve interviewed a loooooooot of scientists over the years. And one thing I\u2019ve noticed is that the ones who&nbsp;<em>teach\u2026<\/em>are often really good explainers. Because they\u2019ve had so much practice.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Check out how Victor Gensini describes how tornadoes form\u2014with analogies to common household appliances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>If it\u2019s a really, really cold summer day and you open the freezer, what happens to that air as it comes out? It comes out immediately, sinks to the ground. It\u2019s very cold and dense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the other hand,&nbsp;<em>hot&nbsp;<\/em>air always wants to go up. As Victor points out,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>You never talk about a cold air balloon. You only talk about a hot air balloon. You get that air hot. It\u2019s less dense, it\u2019s buoyant. It wants to rise.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>OK, so&nbsp;<em>cold&nbsp;<\/em>air wants to sink down.&nbsp;<em>Hot&nbsp;<\/em>air wants to rise. But in the middle of the U.S., those layers start out reversed. The&nbsp;<em>cold, dry&nbsp;<\/em>air is up high, coming off of the Rocky mountains. The&nbsp;<em>warm wet&nbsp;<\/em>air is down low, coming off the Gulf of Mexico.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>So when you have cold air aloft and warm air at the surface, they essentially just want to trade places, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you take your index fingers and put them right in front of your nose, create some rotation that looks like it\u2019s going forward in front of your nose.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you\u2019re doing this right, your fingers are pointing toward each other, doing a sort of \u201cKeep rolling!\u201d motion. Oh, but P.S.\u2014 if you\u2019re listening to this while you\u2019re driving, keep your damn hands on the wheel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Keep that rotation going, and then point your fingers towards the ceiling. Okay, so what happens is you take that horizontal spin in front of your nose and as your fingers point towards the ceiling, it becomes spin, but now it\u2019s along a vertical axis. And it\u2019s that spin along the vertical axis that can create these mesocyclone, the rotation inside of these parent storms.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Okay, how does that log lying down, that column of air that\u2019s lying down, rotate 90 degrees so it\u2019s pointing up?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>You\u2019ve got to have a strong updraft to push it up. So imagine again, your fingers push up that updraft, that updraft is pushing up that rotation into the vertical.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>OK. So now you know how tornadoes form, why the U.S. is the global leader in tornadoes, and how they\u2019re different from hurricanes\u2014tornadoes are&nbsp;<em>much&nbsp;<\/em>smaller, and they come and go in a matter of minutes. And they can do much worse damage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now we come to Victor Gensini\u2019s paper, the one that generated 500 requests for interviews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;The idea for the study actually just became\u2014I was, we were, again, I mentioned I storm chase. We had a couple years in a row, I think it was like \u201812, \u201813 and \u201814, just really abysmal tornado years. I mean, very good for the people of the Great Plains, very bad for me. Very bad.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I was like, over the last good record that we have\u2014have there been any spatial trends?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so I started just, you know, throwing numbers into spreadsheets, looking at various regions, how the trends happened in the regions. And I remember\u2014I distinctly remember sitting at my computer and I hit Enter. I was like, \u201cwow, that\u2019s fascinating.\u201d And I knew right away I was like, this has to be published immediately. I think that the next morning I started writing the paper immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After the break\u2014I\u2019ll tell you what he discovered. Yeah, I know, that\u2019s super manipulative, making you wait through the ad break. But hey\u2014how much did you pay for this podcast?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>[Break]<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n<p>Before the break, I left you tantalized and tormented by the promise that I would reveal the contents of Victor Gensini\u2019s discovery about American tornadoes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;I think I wrote the paper and maybe three or four days with Harold Brooks. We got it submitted. And actually, funny story\u2014the first place we went to it was the Bulletin of the American Meterological Society. We were actually rejected there. But it eventually got to the peer review literature in Nature\u2014probably a higher-impact journal anyway.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what the paper&nbsp;<em>said&nbsp;<\/em>was that Tornado Alley is&nbsp;<em>moving<\/em>. It\u2019s shifting to the east, from the wide open, unpopulated Plains states into the more densely populated states where a lot more people can die.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Although to be fair, Victor hates the wording I just used.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>All right. So we Americans may have heard of Tornado Alley. What is that?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It\u2019s a term I don\u2019t like.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Really!&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I don\u2019t like it, I don\u2019t like it, it\u2019s a media misconception, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If I tell you Tornado Alley, first of all, most people are going to imagine themselves in Kansas or Oklahoma or Texas.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The answer is, Tornado Alley is everywhere. Tornadoes happen in all 50 states, including in Alaska and Hawaii. Yes, they happen with higher frequency in Texas, and Oklahoma, and Kansas, Nebraska.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It just, it leads people to believe that if I\u2019m in Ohio or I\u2019m in North Carolina, I don\u2019t have to worry about that. Tornadoes, again, can happen any time of the year, as long as those conditions are favorable. And so, you know, I\u2019m kind of getting away from the use of \u2018Alley,\u2019 even though there is certainly an area of the country in the central Great Plains.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David<\/strong>&nbsp;Well, what should we call it? The \u2018greater frequency zone\u2019?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yeah, that\u2019s a good question. \u2018The tornado high frequency zone.\u2019 I don\u2019t know. I don\u2019t have a good name for it. You know, I think I\u2019m okay with the use as long as everything that I just said is also said alongside of the use of \u201cTornado Alley,\u201d so that we educate people that the alley is not just an alley that has hard bounds.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He\u2019s got an issue with \u201calley\u201d part of \u201ctornado alley.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>First of all, what do you think of when you think of alley? You think of bowling alley, which means there\u2019s a lane.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>When I was researching this, most of the scientifically-based maps that I saw showed, yes, a higher concentration in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas. But it was it was not, as you say, a strip. It was like this giant amoeba.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It almost looks like\u2014a C. The top of the C starts in like Illinois, Indiana. It arcs out towards Iowa and Nebraska. It comes down through the central plains of Texas, Oklahoma. And then it actually curves back towards Alabama and Mississippi and even portions of Georgia. So there\u2019s it\u2019s like a C-shape, where Missouri is kind of cut out a little bit.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What\u2019s interesting, though, David, is if you plot the number of tornadoes, but then plot the number of tornadoes that kill people, there is a huge dichotomy there. Tornadoes happen in the plains, but where are they killing people? Totally different. I mean, we\u2019re talking hundreds of miles east from the greatest frequency zone where people are dying.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>And this is where your paper comes in. Right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yeah, absolutely. What we\u2019ve been seeing over the last 40 years is Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, et cetera.\u2014these Great Plains, the Tornado Alley, if you will, even though I hate that term\u2014decreasing there, right, with frequency. So over the last 40 years, the number of tornadoes that we\u2019ve seen there have actually gone down.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And where they\u2019ve been increasing in places like Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, portions of the mid-South. And in those areas, there\u2019s lots of trees. If you have lots of trees, it\u2019s very hard to see the incoming storm and incoming tornado. Storms there are more likely to happen at night because of their basically distance away from that north-south oriented mountain chain, right? So when they\u2019re happening, right, it\u2019s more likely they\u2019re moving east into the overnight hours.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[music]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the reason we care about nighttime arrivals is the same reason we care about trees: If you can\u2019t see the tornadoes coming, you\u2019re not as prepared\u2014and you\u2019re more likely to die.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But wait\u2014it gets better. Meaning worse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>But probably most importantly is we have a more vulnerable population. You have a lot of people in the south, mid-south, living in a weak frame housing stock and mobile homes. I mean, some counties in the mid-south, upwards of 80, 90 percent of their infrastructure that people are living in, residential, is mobile homes. And we know if there\u2019s one place you don\u2019t want to be in a mobile home\u2014or during a tornado, it\u2019s in a mobile home or in a vehicle, okay?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just because of this issue, they\u2019re more likely to produce casualties.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>So what you confirmed is that\u2014let me see if I phrase this right. The amorphous, roughly C-shaped amoeba of higher probability traditionally associated with the Plains states is shifting eastward into more populous, more vulnerable states.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Almost correct. I love the description, except I would not use the word shift.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>But, but, but, but even the word \u2018shift,\u2019 though, could just mean a shift in preponderance, or a shift in likelihood.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Exactly. If you\u2019re talking about a shift in the probability space, that\u2019s exactly what it is. If you\u2019re talking about a geographic location shift, that\u2019s where the issue comes in.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We don\u2019t want to tell people in Oklahoma and Texas they don\u2019t worry about it, it\u2019s shifting. What we really want to highlight is this increasing threat from tornadoes, greater frequency, greater number\u2014happening in the mid-south, where we know people are already extremely vulnerable due to socioeconomic issues.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Okay, so\u2014in Tornado Alley, still the most tornadoes, still a lot of tornadoes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>And farther east, an increasing number of tornadoes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Exactly. Exactly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>And why?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It\u2019s very likely to me that it\u2019s a component of the actual input into the atmosphere from humans. So anthropogenic climate change, in addition to some degree of natural variability.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It\u2019s very consistent with what our climate models show as we get into later this century, where the Great Plains, specifically Texas, Oklahoma, begin to dry out and become basically these big heat domes, hot heat domes, that don\u2019t produce a lot of severe weather.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[music]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so, in October 2018, Victor\u2019s paper appeared in the journal&nbsp;<em>Nature.&nbsp;<\/em>It raised a lot of eyebrows, and dropped a lot of jaws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;The, the trends study obviously garnered a lot of public attention. A lot of the Associated Press, a lot of the news articles were like, \u2018Tornado Alley is shifting, ahhh!\u2019 Right, and everyone was up in arms, and I had like 500 media requests overnight.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, there\u2019s lots and lots of issues and caveats, as there are with almost any scientific study. So it\u2019s, it\u2019s my\u2014I felt it as the lead author, I sort of took it upon myself that, you know, I\u2019m going to do as many of these interviews as I can. I want to sort of set the record straight in terms of what we know and what we don\u2019t know about things like tornadoes, tornadoes and climate change.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Okay, so\u2014is real life bearing out what you said? Are Tennessee and Mississippi, are they seeing more damage, more loss of life?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Absolutely. I mean, if you look at the data from \u201819-\u201920, and then the preliminary data so far from \u201821, very active in the southeastern United States.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After we published that study, for example the Nashville tornado occurred. I don\u2019t know if you remember that event as well.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I do remember it. It was March 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[News clip montage]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>BRANDIS<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>We heard the wind and got the alarms on our phones. And we just sprinted out of the building. So running down the hallway, the ceiling was just caving in, debris everywhere, and water is pouring from the ceiling, like waterfalls in the hallway.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>GUY<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>The whole back of the roof was caved in, the front of it caved in, we have no front porch, and all the houses down our street are completely gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>NEWS<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>If you look in the distance, that is the cone, or the V of the tornado as it was actually touched down in Nashville. This is a massive, massive funnel on the ground right there. You can see just how big that is, which is why we\u2019re seeing this type of damage over a wide area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the end, the Nashville tornado killed 25 people and cost $1.6 billion in damage\u2014the sixth costliest tornado in U.S. history. And it was hundreds of miles east of the traditional Tornado Alley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>So there are a lot\u2014I hate to cherry pick just Nashville, but there are events that have continued to occur and will continue to occur in the southeastern United States.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Victor says that the climate crisis isn\u2019t the only reason the death and destruction are getting worse. We also keep building in Nature\u2019s way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;So I think part of the, really the, the, the drive-home point is that there is a huge expanding human footprint that these hazards are hitting. We\u2019re looking around going, holy shit, the world\u2019s on fire. We\u2019re having all these disasters. We have wildfires in the news. Tornadoes, hail, hurricanes. We just saw a massive heat wave in the west. That was well beyond anything we\u2019ve ever recorded. We\u2019re very certain that climate change had some component, some piece to that.<strong>&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But\u2014what does this other piece of us just having so many more assets, so many more things to hit, these extreme weather disaster\u2014by these extreme weather events, and how much is that contributing to the overall picture of economic loss not only in the U.S., but in the world?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Well, are there any positive trends in the way people are building and living in these increasingly vulnerable areas?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I haven\u2019t seen anything. In fact, it seems after these disasters occur, we simply go back and build half-assed construction with very, very little oversight. You know, like, what?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Building codes and structures, unfortunately, right, those are set at the local level. And so there\u2019s no federal mandate, right, of \u201cOh, you live in Oklahoma City, you have to have a tornado or a house that can withstand an F3 tornado.\u201d None of that exists in the United States, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And yet that costs money. I get it. But it\u2019s a long term investment, okay? Would you rather be paying for the disaster in 25 years, or put up the money up front, and invest in a more resilient infrastructure that\u2019s going to be less prone to these types of events in the future?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I mean, we as a species have never been great at anticipating\u2014like, we still smoke, we still don\u2019t exercise. I mean, we know, right? We still don\u2019t really take climate change seriously. I mean, we should have started 40 years ago.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yes, I have\u2014I would not argue with that. I think it\u2019s\u2014where, when do you get to the point? What is the level of disaster that has to occur in order for us to go\u2014Yep, okay, we need to do something now, versus, you know, Oh, we just had another six standard deviation anomaly heat wave in the Pacific Northwest. And British Columbia is on fire, literally on fire right now. What do you do, you know?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And, as usual in the world of climate chaos, people without a lot of money get hit first and worst.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>The people that are going to be most impacted by places\u2014like, by most of the impacts of climate change\u2014drought, flooding, sea level rise are going to be areas that are very, very socioeconomically disadvantaged. When, as a species, do we make that critical call of like, \u201cOkay, we\u2019re serious now. We weren\u2019t before, but we\u2019re serious now.\u201d And is when that happens, is it too late?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>OK. So now you know that what\u2019s traditionally known as Tornado Alley is shifting\u2014or maybe I should say&nbsp;<em>growing\u2014<\/em>into the more vulnerable, more populous states to the East. And that tornadoes form super fast; they\u2019re not like hurricanes, where we see it coming a week before it hits. OK. So what are you supposed to do?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, about an hour before the tornado, your phone, or the radio or TV, might announce a tornado&nbsp;<em>watch.&nbsp;<\/em>That\u2019s when the conditions are perfect for tornadoes to form, but nobody\u2019s seen one yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A tornado&nbsp;<em>warning<\/em>&nbsp;means that somebody\u2019s actually spotted one.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong>&nbsp;For most people, it\u2019s as simple as get to the lowest floor in your home. If you don\u2019t have a basement, that\u2019s okay. Just get to the lowest floor and put as many walls between you in the tornado as possible. That\u2019s it. So if that\u2019s an interior closet, great, that\u2019s a bathroom, great, if it\u2019s underneath stairs, great, just get to the lowest floor. That will give you a very, very high likelihood of surviving even a strong tornado if you take that.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The other thing that we tell people is that it\u2019s not a bad idea to have a bicycle helmet in there. Most of the casualties we see are blunt force trauma to the head. So what a better move than just putting a bike helmet on, you know, and crouching down into your\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Wow!&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor<\/strong><strong>&nbsp;<\/strong>Yeah, yeah. In your severe weather safety kit, whether it\u2019s water, batteries, flashlight\u2014bike helmets are cheap, pick up a bike helmet and put a bike helmet on. That way, you have some sort of cushion between you and the flying debris.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And Victor has special advice if you live in a mobile home.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Well, if you\u2019re in a mobile home, don\u2019t wait for the warning to be issued. You should be taking action at the watch stage, when the conditions are favorable, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many times, you\u2019re lucky to get 10 or 15 minutes lead time when these events occur.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, and I understand not everybody has the access or the means to just pick up and go somewhere. But there are community shelters in many places. You could perhaps go to a neighbor\u2019s house or somebody that has, you know, a sturdier structure. But you don\u2019t want to be in a mobile home during a tornado and you don\u2019t want to be in a vehicle. Those are two areas you got to sort of figure it out.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>So you\u2014you have completed your storm chasing season for 2021, right?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Yes. We\u2019re kind of all getting back. We\u2019re getting unpacked, finally starting to sort through our pictures. And then by about Christmas, we, something sets in called SDS, or Supercell Deprivation Syndrome, where we start planning our trip, right, for next year.<strong>&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so our pilgrimage again, you know, begins.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know what? I\u2019m starting to get the impression that Victor Gensini really loves tornadoes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>It\u2019s like this giant orchestra, right, that\u2019s playing. And every instrument has a role. And you\u2019ve got to figure out what\u2019s the moisture doing, what\u2019s this doing? What\u2019s the shear? I mean, there\u2019s so many moving parts that, you know, just understanding the percussion is not enough. You got to understand the ensemble. And that\u2019s what makes this problem so challenging.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>David&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>Well, if it were up to me, I would suggest that you look at mid-levels for rotation and increase the PRF.<strong>&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Victor&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><\/strong>I love it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Credits<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_9855\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-49-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3\">https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 1px !important;\">Podcast: <a href=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/?powerpress_pinw=49-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"unsungscience-20211105.mp3\">Download<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tornadoes are nasty and dangerous. They appear and disappear so fast, there\u2019s usually no time for evacuation\u2014and the United States gets 75% of all the world\u2019s tornadoes, about 1,300 of them a year. They occur all year \u2018round, in all 50 states, but the biggest swarm forms in Tornado Alley, in the southern Plains states like Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. In 2018, storm chaser and meteorologist Victor Gensini made a startling discovery: Tornado Alley has been shifting eastward.<span class=\"excerpt-more-link\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/2021\/11\/05\/tornado-alley-is-shifting-eastward-and-were-not-ready\/\">More <svg class=\"svg-icon\" width=\"24\" height=\"24\" aria-hidden=\"true\" role=\"img\" focusable=\"false\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><path fill-rule=\"evenodd\" clip-rule=\"evenodd\" d=\"M6.96954 10.2804L11.9999 15.3107L17.0302 10.2804L15.9695 9.21973L11.9999 13.1894L8.0302 9.21973L6.96954 10.2804Z\" fill=\"currentColor\"\/><\/svg><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"excerpt-audio-block\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/unsung.davidpogue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/unsungscience-20211105.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions\/52"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unsungscience.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}