U.S. On Track To Break Record For Tornadoes

[weatherbud]

La Nina was factor earlier, now it's a stuck weather pattern.

WASHINGTON - Another week, another rumbling train of tornadoes that obliterates entire city blocks, smashing homes to their foundations and killing people even as they cower in their basements.

With the year not even half done, 2008 is already the deadliest tornado year in the United States since 1998 and seems on track to break the U.S. record for the number of twisters in a year, according to the National Weather Service. Also, this year's storms seem to be unusually powerful.

But like someone who has lost all his worldly possessions to a whirlwind, meteorologists cannot explain exactly why this is happening.

"There are active years and we don't particularly understand why," said research meteorologist Harold Brooks at the National Severe Storms Lab in Norman, Okla.


Homes in Parkersburg, Iowa, were destroyed by a tornado Sunday.
The twister was the strongest on the Fujita Scale at a 5 —
the first 5 in the U.S. since a tornado nearly obliterated Greensburg,
Kan., just over a year ago.


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