Twin Cities Tornado Outbreak of 1965

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Twin Cities Tornado Outbreak of 1965

Tornado tracks through Twin Cities Metro Area

Date of tornado outbreak:

May 6, 1965

Duration¹:

2 hours, 6 minutes (6:08 PM to 8:14 PM CST)

Maximum rated tornado²:

F4 tornado

Tornadoes caused:

Damages:

Estimated $51 Million^[1]

Fatalities:

13 (683 injured)^[2]

Areas affected:

Twin Cities (Minnesota)

¹Time from first tornado to last tornado
²Most severe tornado damage; see Fujita Scale

The Twin Cities Tornado Outbreak of 1965 is the outbreak of tornadoes that occurred around Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, USA on May 6, 1965. It is most often remembered for the F4 tornado that hit Fridley, Minnesota. Thirteen people were killed in the six tornadoes that touched down in the Twin Cities area that day. In all, four tornadoes were rated F4, one was rated F3, and other was rated F2. This event caused more dollar damage than any single weather event in Minnesota history at that time.^[1]

1 Outbreak description
2 Confirmed tornadoes
3 Survivor stories
4 See also
5 References
6 External links and sources

[edit] Outbreak description

Tornado damage near Hamburg, Minnesota.

Temperatures on May 6 were in the upper 70s with high dewpoints, which was considered to be unusual for early May in Minnesota.^[1] A strong upper level system moving in from the southwest and a nearby slow-moving cold front helped spark the storms.

Considering this outbreak occurred just three weeks after the Palm Sunday tornado outbreak, quick and successful warnings from the U.S. Weather Bureau and transmission from WCCO Radio kept the death toll relatively low. This was also the first time in Minnesota state history where the civil defense sirens were used for severe weather purposes.

**Outbreak death toll**
State	Total	County	County total
Minnesota	13	Anoka	3
		Carver	3
		Hennepin	6
		Sibley	1
Totals	13
All deaths were tornado-related

The first tornado touched down at 6:08 PM just east of the town of Cologne in Carver County. According to the U.S. Weather Bureau, this twister was rated an F4, killed three people, and injured 175. An F2 tornado that touched down in Sibley County at 6:43 PM killed one person and also injured 175 others.

Two tornadoes hit Fridley that day, just over an hour apart. A man who called WCCO radio after the first Fridley tornado claimed on air that he had been in his car when the tornado hit and that the tornado blew out his car windows. He escaped that incident without harm, but it is believed this same man was then killed by the second Fridley twister later that night. In all, six people were killed in the Fridley tornadoes and over 180 were injured. In Fridley, over 450 homes were destroyed, and neighboring Mounds View also sustained heavy damage. Photographs for the earlier Deephaven and second Fridley tornado were published in the Minneapolis Tribune (now Star Tribune) newspaper. Early radar images show the supercells as they moved through the area.^[2]

These storms formed as training supercells; an atmospheric phenomenon that is extremely rare in Minnesota. Because of the training, the same general areas from Sibley County through Carver and Hennepin and into northwestern Ramsey counties kept getting the brunt of these cells.

[edit] Confirmed tornadoes

Table of confirmed tornadoes - after surveys by local weather service offices

Confirmed Total	Confirmed F0	Confirmed F1	Confirmed F2	Confirmed F3	Confirmed F4	Confirmed F5
6	0	0	1	1	4	0

F#	Location	County	Time (UTC)	Path length	Damage
F4	E of Cologne	Carver	1408	13 miles	Tornado touched down just east of Cologne in Carver County and dissipated in the northwestern portion of Minnetrista in Hennepin County after being on ground for 13 miles. It killed three people and injured 175.
F4	Chanhassen	Carver	1427	7 miles	Tornado touched down near Lake Susan in Chanhassen and traveled 7 miles toward Deephaven in Hennepin County. It resulted in no injuries or fatalities.
F3	E of New Auburn	Sibley	1434	16 miles	Tornado touched down about 3 miles east of New Auburn in Sibley County and moved to just west of Lester Prairie in McLeod County. It was on the ground for 16 miles, but there were no injuries or fatalities.
F2	E of Green Isle	Sibley	1443	11 miles	Tornado touched down about two miles east of Green Isle in Sibley County and was on the ground 11 miles. It dissipated about two miles southwest of Waconia in Carver County. It killed one person and injured 175.
F4	Fridley	Anoka	1506	7 miles	Tornado touched down in the southwesternmost corner of Fridley in Anoka County and moved across the Northern Ordnance plant, and dissipated just northeast of Laddie Lake in Blaine in Anoka County. It was on the ground for 7 miles, killed three people, and injured 175.
F4	Golden Valley	Hennepin	1614	18 miles	Tornado touched down in Golden Valley in Hennepin County and moved across north Minneapolis, Fridley in Anoka County, Mounds View in Ramsey County, and dissipated just west of Centerville in Anoka County after being on the ground for 18 miles. It killed six people and injured 158.
Source: National Climatic Database Center

[edit] Survivor stories

As one of the survivors of this tornado outbreak, I was very young at the time, having turned 8, just a month and a half earlier. I was on knoll drive, which was connected to louise drive in mounds view. (you can find a picture of what our particular tornado did at: This link) I remember the day as it was nice enough in may that we actually ate dinner outside on our new picnic table (by the end of the night we would have another picnic table courtesy of the tornado, that and someone elses roof) Just over and hour later the first tornado hit fridley, but our f4 tornado would wait another 2 hours later. That night we had been hearing all night about all the tornadoes hitting. Up to that point, 7 people had already died, and hundreds injured, but our tornado alone would double those figures, increasing the death toll to 13 and the injuries to over 600.

Tornado damage in Fridley, Minnesota.

We were in the basement cause of all those other tornadoes, and one had already hit the area, when news came of another. We set a couch up to the wall, and grabbed the cushions and held them behind the couch for protection. My brother, who was just back from the navy was at the basement window looking for any evidence of what maybe coming our way, the radio on wcco 830 had already said it was coming our way. Then my brother yelled, here it comes, he ran around the couch, we all held our cushions above us, and then the lights went out, all was quiet for about 10 seconds nothing dead silence. Then just as quickly the smashing of windows as though 20 were broken at once, then the loud thundering noise, that train sound roaring we held onto our cushions tightly, then it stopped. 10 seconds of roar. we looked up, our basement still here. My brother went up stairs, then we got up and started going upstairs to the main level, the house was still here, the windows all gone. I looked out to the living room, the picture window gone, there was just a bit of light, and i wasnt quite ready for what i saw. The house across the street was gone, the one next to it, gone, the one on the other side, gone. The houses behind them all gone, and the homes across the street from them all gone. From left to right, the houses were gone.
We had to leave, the fire engines had arrived and asked about injured, we had the neighbors from across the street, the girls were sick vomiting but they were safe. When they looked up after the tornado hit, they saw sky. As we got rounded out, we had to walk thru a path of live wires shooting sparks here and there, we were walking by homes that were gone, one house was gone and the tornado then lifted the car and put it on there kitchen floor. As we came out the other side of the path the police and ambulances were waiting, there was a man being held back by police, he was trying to get home to a house that was no longer there, he was screaming as he needed to get to his wife and kids, but the fire department guys already knew, he would never see his wife and kids alive again. In another scene that would play out the following morning, my other brother would see the police and workers around a home that was not there, he saw the man there in tears, as he looked down to the basement, there were shards of wood and concrete and bricks, people trying to clean all the debris, and under that debris lay another young son whose time had come, yet the father stood tears in his eyes, saying he knew his son would be fine, yet another father who would lose what was most precious, to this storm.

The rain was starting to get heavy as my brother came up with the car, so we could get out of this nightmare, if ever there was a nightmare come to life, it was may 6th, 1965, in a little town called mounds view minnesota.

– Dalej