Looking Back: 4/14/2012 Plains Tornado Outbreak
We are coming up on the 6 year (updating this post from a year ago) anniversary of a significant tornado outbreak on the Plains, and one that has personal significance to me. Among the 122 tornadoes reported that day, one took aim on Wichita, Kansas. My apartment, as well as those of several coworkers, took direct or very near direct hits from an upper EF-2/lower EF-3 tornado.
The SPC issued an extremely rare Day Two High risk. It included a 60% hatched tornado area.
In their Public Severe Weather Outlook issued the morning of April 14th, 2012, the SPC stated they were expecting an outbreak of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes, with some long-track tornadoes, over the Central Plains. All the ingredients needed for a severe weather outbreak, a strong upper level low, a speedy mid-level jet, plenty of instability and low level shear, were there.
This Tornado Watch was labeled a PDS, or a Particularly Dangerous Situation. The wording in the Watch is about as strong as you’ll ever see.
“DESTRUCTIVE TORNADOES…LARGE HAIL TO 2.5 INCHES IN DIAMETER… THUNDERSTORM WIND GUSTS TO 70 MPH.”
The Tornado Watch that was issued that afternoon covered much of the state of Kansas, portions of western and central Oklahoma, a few counties in the panhandle of Texas and a few counties in southwestern Nebraska. Several supercells were visible, already having developed in a line, from southwest Oklahoma into northeast into Kansas.
The High Risk and PDS Tornado Watches certainly verified that day. The unfiltered report on SPC listed 153 tornadoes, 106 wind reports and 202 hail reports. It is important to note that not all reports are actual tornadoes. Many reports are of the same tornado. The filtered number for the day was 122 tornadoes, which is still a very significant amount.
A report compiled by the Wichita NWS breaks down the details on all of the tornadoes in central Kansas.
This report on United States Tornadoes website has additional statistics and details on the entire event spanning from April 14–15, 2012.
The tornadoes in total are listed here:
1 EF4
5 EF3’s
3 EF2’s
33 EF1’s
55 EF0
There were 73 injuries and unfortunately, 6 deaths.
From a personal standpoint, this outbreak had a pretty significant impact. I was a Colorado girl, newly relocated to the Plains, to Tornado Alley. My home town of Windsor, Colorado had been hit by an EF3 tornado in 2008, and though I was not there at the time, the damage I saw afterwards left a very lasting impact on the future meteorologist I would become.
I had only been in Wichita, Kansas for about 2 & 1/2 months when it became apparent that a severe weather outbreak was going to take place and that we were going to be right in the heart of it. I was with some coworkers and friends late the night of April 12th, when the rare Day 2 High Risk was issued. The next day, I went to my apartment complex front office to ask where I should shelter, since I lived on the second floor. I was told that tornadoes don’t really come into Wichita and that it would be fine. I tried to warn them that this event looked to be a very dangerous one, but my words were brushed off.
The morning of the 14th was an overcast and humid one. Clouds streamed by quickly overhead, with southerly winds gusting to 40 mph. We stayed socked in with cloud cover for much of the day, as the outbreak unfolded around us. For a time, it seemed like we may get lucky and not be impacted by severe weather. However, right around sunset, conditions began to change at a rapid pace. Clouds quickly cleared out and we begin to closely watch a tornadic storm that had developed down by Woodward, Oklahoma. The storms that day had been long-tracked, and if this one followed the same trend, it would likely track right into Wichita.
My shift at AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions, in downtown Wichita, had ended at 6pm, but there was no way I was going home to a second story apartment with no internet. Staying at work was probably one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Before leaving for work that morning, I had shut my cat into the most interior room, the bathroom, with food and water and his liter box. That was also a good decision, despite what he may have thought.
As the evening wore on, the storm moved ever closer to Wichita and continued to produce tornadoes off and on through north central Oklahoma and south central Kansas. This was what the radar looked like around 9:15pm CDT. The storm was producing a tornado southwest of the Wichita Metro.
A velocity couplet (south of Argonia) and a hook were clearly visible and there were multiple reports coming in of a tornado on the ground, being lit by lightning. If the storm had stayed on its current trajectory, the downtown Wichita Metro would have taken a direct hit. The tornado briefly fell apart, but quickly developed once again, near Haysville. Fellow meteorologist and coworker Andrew Gagnon and his wife took shelter in their basement just before it hit, shortly after 10pm. “Luckily for us it had just touched down again at that point, and was relatively weak. My neighborhood had some tree and fence damage and shingle damage to several houses,” Gagnon said.
The tornado then intensified and turned right, now taking aim on southeast Wichita. In its path lay Oaklawn Trailer Park, McConnell Air Force Base and many apartments and homes, mine included. Gagnon said he went to a neighborhood in Oaklawn a couple weeks later and numerous homes were unlivable due to major damage to roofs and outer walls. I also saw the devastation the tornado caused to that neighborhood and it was very severe. That was where the majority of the EF3 damage occurred.
As myself and several coworkers sat in the downtown office, relieved that we did not need to take shelter, the realization of where the tornado was now heading sunk in.
Several of us lived on the southeast side of Wichita and it became apparent that our apartments were likely to take a direct hit from this tornado. There was nothing we could do but watch radar and listen to reports coming in.
The tornado seemed to very closely follow the Kansas Turnpike as it came into southeast Wichita. The image below is the track the tornado took and shows the width and where damage occurred. The green drop point is the location of my apartment complex.
Throughout all of this, I had been posting updates to Facebook and Twitter. Family members across the country were watching the news, as this was now getting nationwide coverage. Many of them had little reason to pay attention to severe weather prior to this, and seeing such significant reports coming in from the city I lived in was very eye-opening and scary.
The next images were all taken at my apartment complex that night and the next day. The building I lived in sustained only exterior damage, with shingles and siding being blown off. Other buildings and cars in the area were not so fortunate.
The tornado lifted shortly after wreaking havoc in that neighborhood. Soon after the tornado lifted, I drove home, wondering what I would find. I was thankful that my building had not been severely damaged, despite extensive damage to others only a few hundred feet away. My cat, who was home alone in a second story bathroom throughout the tornado, is now scarred for life when it comes to storms. A single rumble of thunder will send him running to my side for protection.
Many other businesses and homes were not so fortunate and sustained heavy damage, including Spirit AeroSystems and Boeing, and were forced to close for a day. Thankfully, the several hundred employees at work at the time had all taken shelter and no one was hurt.
That was the second time I had been personally affected by a tornado and once again served to open my eyes to a few things.
The first was just how destructive Mother Nature can be and in such bizarre ways. From a meteorological standpoint, it was absolutely fascinating to see the tornado damage up close. The way the metal car overhang was twisted upward, or how a stick of wood was driven into the metal of a car. How buildings on either side of mine had severe damage, but my building only had superficial damage. How small sticks had been driven into the ground at a certain angle. Until you’ve seen firsthand how a tornado damages the things it touches, it’s hard to fully comprehend their power of destruction.
The second was how a community really comes together after a natural disaster. Several friends and colleagues offered to let me stay with them until power was restored at my complex, and there was no way of knowing how long that would be. Many people reached out to me via social media to make sure I was alright, both physically and emotionally/mentally. I also gained a huge amount of respect for the team I worked with at AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions, for staying so calm in the face of a very dangerous storm that was, for a time, headed right for the office. If it had not been for their level-headedness and experience that allowed them to stay composed as sirens were blaring and a tornado spun in our direction, I surely would have been far more panicked.
It may sound cliche, but living through the tornado outbreak of April 14th, 2012 is an experience I will never forget. It gave me a greater understanding of the power and nuances of a tornado (with the caveat that my understanding is still pretty limited because tornadoes are just nuts), and also a greater appreciation people and how a disaster or difficult situation brings us all together.
