Severe weather

[Deleted]

How expensive are those? If its out of most peoples price point, a basement or storm shelter is still going to be the better option. Especially as for the latter picture, you're still going to need a shit ton of work to fix it. Also, blown doors and windows will still let debris in that can kill you.

Obviously they've got shelters as well.

[Crissi]

I cant find any information on those domes that isn't monolithic.org. Not even a FEMA website.

Like it says its near absolute proof against EF5 according to FEMA, but I cant find any documentation backing that claim up. and even then, those pictures didnt exactly say wether the insides were still ok, and if the structure was in good enough shape to not need structural repairs after. If its going to need structural repair, may as well get a normal house + basement / shelter.

[Gheld]

The only truly safe place to be in a tornado is somewhere else. But as I said earlier... The hotbed is the hotbed because the flat terrain makes it a great place for the development of the most powerful thunderstorms on the planet. It also makes it the only viable place to grow enough food to feed hundreds of millions of people. So you just have to have a personal tornado safety plan in place and hope for the best.

[Deleted]

those pictures didnt exactly say wether the insides were still ok, and if the structure was in good enough shape to not need structural repairs after. If its going to need structural repair, may as well get a normal house + basement / shelter.

Well, one would think that a building that's still standing would at least keep containers inside of it somewhat intact, and at least the stuff in there might still be found and some of it salvageable, as opposed to the tornado just wiping your entire life away. Unless, of course, people keep their stuff in the storm shelters.

[klogaroth]

Last time anything of extreme weather happned in my area in the UK was when this happened (I use the word extreme losely as the extremes we get now days are just heavy dopwnpours of rain lol).... I was 7 years old at the time... :P

If you want to be really picky a hurricane is a tropical cyclone, but the Great Storm of 1987 was an extratropical cyclone. Hence it didn't get a hurricane name from meteorologists and was instead called the Great Storm of 1987.

So when he says there was no hurricane on the way he is correct. Unless the UK goes for a bit of a wander down to the tropics we can't get hurricanes.
He did rather undersell the wind speeds we could expect though.

[feellucky]

In oklahoma people do build houses with steel frames, its just much more expensive. Another fairly common practice and I think much more practical is a partial underground structure where you have a basement or one wall has earth built up to cover it. Having lived in the epicenter of tornado alley for all of my 35 years though I've never been in a tornado. I've had plenty circulations go over or near me, but never been directly hit and the worst ever was some minor wind damage. Same for all of my family that live in Oklahoma. I don't think people appreciate how rare the chance of getting directly effected by a tornado is, even in the heart of tornado alley. The cost to build all tornado proof structures far outweighs the cost of rebuilding every time.

To the OPs question, I can't answer as I've never personally known anyone directly hit by one. Had a couple friends with close calls but they ended up with just minor structural damage to their homes, which is what happens 90% of the time even if you are in the path.

[the game]

Raise your hand if you've been victimised by a tornado!

Are you really making fun of the lives that are lost from tornado and hurricane weather every year? All the people who are injured?

[Shinra1]

Are you really making fun of the lives that are lost from tornado and hurricane weather every year? All the people who are injured?

It was a mean girls reference!

Besides, I found your use of the word victim pretty awkward in the OP.

[volkanik]

Well if it counts my grandma and aunt's family live like 30 minutes from Joplin.

[Citizen T]

Been through two tornadoes and Hurricane Hugo in Charleston SC. One tornado was close enough for high winds but not overly dangerous. One went right down the middle of the street in a residential neighborhood without touching a single house. That was kind of scary while watching from a basement window about 20 yards away.

Hurricane Hugo in Charleston was pretty bad. I was in the Navy at the time and escaped inland about 25 miles during the storm. It took us about 8 hours to drive back to the base due to downed trees, power poles/lines, etc.

[starlord]

never personally dealt with a tornado, had several close calls though. seen a few water spouts as well. what got us was a microburst (reverse tornado). ripped off the chimney and landed it right on top of the family car, good times. my house was built into the side of a hill.

where i am now we get 50-100 knot winds at certain times of the year, not much fun either.

for those wondering what its like to live in tornado alley, its probably the same as any other place...
you just get taught safety and warning signs, stay in a basement if you have one, or a room with no windows. look for finger clouds. sky will turn funny colors (seen green/orange/purple before). listen for a sound like a train. find a ditch if you are caught in the open.

its just a natural hazard like anything else, i was more worried about poisonous snakes.

[zenkai]

What I don't get is when people build houses out of twigs in the Tornado Alley, then lose everything, and proceed to build a new house out of twigs in the same spot. I can appreciate the "this is my home" -sentiment, and I can even appreciate being poor and not being able to even consider any other kind of way of building than the typical twig house, but I mean... You'd think some people would at least try.

Most people in Tornado ally have storm shelters, I mean people could leave and not use that farm land...

[MatthewOU2015]

April 27th 2011 never forget

[nextormento]

There's only so sturdy you can build a house.
Also, further proof that concrete and steel can be hurt:

We can build them much, much sturdier than we usually do. It's a mater of risk assessment. You folks prefer to build things that are easily and cheaply replaceable, and that's alright.
Those examples show no sign of structural damage, though. Just a curtain wall to replace. (Visual inspection doesn't quite cut it, but those specific buildings appear to be repaired today).

[willtron]

Well, the shape of the building matters as well. Of course if you're dead set building a box-shaped building in tornado country, then no amount of concrete is going to help you. Here's a few examples of "tornado proof" or "tornado resistant" buildings I could find.

I'd rather live in a twig house than a sturdy penis house.

There is such amount of concrete. I work in construction engineering - I know such volumes of concrete and methods of structural design exist.

[Khaza-R]

I've lived through numerous hurricanes while living in south Florida. Thankfully the only thing I've ever lost is come trees and a few days of power.

Tornadoes are quite scary though. I would not want to go through one of those.

[Reg]

Just Hurricane Irene and Sandy which were pretty destructive considering the Northeast doesn't really prepare for hurricanes. We've had some freak snow falls, but nothing too crazy.

[Polyxo]

I lived in Miami during hurricanes Katrina and Wilma (and one other one I forget, because it was boring). We tried sailboarding with some sheets and skateboards. Our dormitory lost like 8 sheet sets that night. I also grew up in western New York, and went through countless blizzards as well as 2 once in a century ice storms. The ice storms were the worst experience of the group, as we were without power and heat for weeks in the dead of winter. Or house was smoky for like weeks after that from burning so much stuff in the fireplace.

[Damajin]

^^ Concrete itself is actually a relatively weak building material. It has about the same tensile strength as glass of the same thickness. The fact that you can pour it as a liquid and set it into any shape you want and is extremely fire resistant makes it good for setting steel in. And steel structures are expensive.

A steel framed residential sized house would run into the millions of dollars, and still, only the frame would have any chance of surviving a powerful tornado.

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Of course, all those idiots just need to build multi million dollar custom homes. Why didn't they think of that?

Monolithic Domes are only multimillion dollar homes if you make them so. Otherwise they cost about 10-15% above the standard cost per square foot which due to their construction and the benefits you gain from their reduction in maintenance costs, heating and cooling and the like it turns out to be a net gain over the long term. They’re even more resistant to severe weather if they’re partially buried or bermed. I’ve been looking into them for a number of years now as a choice for my home and they’re a solid bet all around.