Flint–Worcester tornado outbreak sequence

Flint-Worcester tornado outbreak

An F4 tornado near Erie, Michigan. Photo courtesy of NOAA
Date of tornado outbreak:	June 7–9, 1953
Duration1:	3 days
Maximum rated tornado2:	F5 tornado
Tornadoes caused:	46
Damages:	$2.56 billion (2006 USD)
Fatalities:	243
Areas affected:	Midwest & Northeast United States
1Time from first tornado to last tornado 2Most severe tornado damage; see Fujita Scale

The Flint–Worcester Tornadoes were two tornadoes, one occurring in Flint, Michigan on June 8, 1953, the other in Worcester, Massachusetts on June 9, 1953. These tornadoes are among the deadliest in United States history and were caused by the same storm system that moved eastward across the nation. The tornadoes are also related together in the public mind because, for a brief period following the Worcester tornado, it was debated in the U.S. Congress whether recent atomic bomb testing in the upper atmosphere had caused the tornadoes. Congressman James E. Van Zandt (R-Penn.) was among several members of Congress who expressed their belief that the June 4th bomb testing created the tornadoes, which occurred far outside the traditional tornado alley. They demanded a response from the government. Meteorologists quickly dispelled such an assertion, and Congressman Van Zandt later retracted his statement.

The Flint-Worcester Tornadoes were the most infamous storms produced by a larger outbreak of severe weather that began in Nebraska, Iowa and Wisconsin, before moving across the Great Lakes states, and then into New York and New England. Other F3 and F4 tornadoes struck other locations in Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire and Ohio.

Contents 1 Confirmed tornadoes 1.1 June 7, 1953 event 1.2 June 8, 1953 event 1.3 June 9, 1953 event 2 Flint tornado 3 Worcester tornado 4 1953 tornado season in perspective 5 See also 6 References 7 Notes 8 External links

Confirmed tornadoes

Confirmed Total	Confirmed F0	Confirmed F1	Confirmed F2	Confirmed F3	Confirmed F4	Confirmed F5
46	11	9	13	7	5	1

This chart shows the number of tornadoes spawned from the initial storm system.

June 7, 1953 event

List of confirmed tornadoes — June 7, 1953
F#	Location	County	Time (UTC)	Path length	Damage
Kansas
F1	E of Morland	Graham	1900	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F2	S of Hill City	Graham	1900	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F0	S of Edmond	Graham	1900	10.9 miles (17.4 km)
F0	NE of Tampa to SW of Herington	Marion, Dickinson	0445	12.6 miles (20.2 km)
Colorado
F1	W of Julesburg	Sedgwick	2000	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F1	N of Julesburg	Sedgwick	2000	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F0	SW of Julesburg (1st tornado)	Sedgwick	2200	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F0	SW of Julesburg (2nd tornado)	Sedgwick	2200	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F0	NW of Julesburg	Sedgwick	2200	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
Nebraska
F2	NE of Mason City	Custer, Sherman, Valley	2030	6.6 miles (10.6 km)
F2	NW of Giltner	Hamilton	2100	6.6 miles (10.6 km)
F0	S of Phillips	Hamilton	2100	4.1 miles (6.6 km)
F1	NE of Rising City to NW of Linwood	Butler	2100	22.7 miles (36.3 km)
F4	NW of Loup City to SW of Ord	Sherman, Valley	2115	15 miles (24 km)	11 deaths
F2	E of Scotia to SW of Spalding	Greeley	2200	20.1 miles (32.2 km)
F2	NE of Octavia	Butler	2200	6.9 miles (11 km)
F3	NW of Albion	Boone	2215	8 miles (12.8 km)
F0	SE of Upland	Franklin	2230	9 miles (14.4 km)
F1	E of Macon	Franklin	2300	15 miles (24 km)
F2	SW of Battle Creek to S of Pierce	Madison	2300	16.6 miles (26.6 km)
F2	SW of Pierce to SW of Laurel	Pierce, Cedar	2300	31 miles (49.6 km)
F1	N of Breslau	Pierce	2310	8.2 miles (13.1 km)
F0	SW of Martinsburg	Dixon	2340	1.5 miles (2.4 km)
F2	NW of Blair	Washington	0045	4.1 miles (6.6 km)
F0	S of Hooper	Dodge	0100	1 mile (1.6 km)
South Dakota
F0	N of Mitchell	Davison	2345	1.5 miles (2.4 km)
Iowa
F2	NE of Westfield	Plymouth	0015	11.3 miles (18.1 km)
F2	N of Ida Grove to E of Fenton	Ida, Sac, Pocahontas, Kossuth	0130	49.2 miles (78.7 km)
F2	N of Gowne to SW of Olaf	Webster, Hamilton, Wright	0300	49 miles (78.4 km)
F3	W of Pomeroy to SE of Bode	Calhoun, Pocahontas, Humboldt	0315	30.7 miles (49.1 km)
F2	NE of Winterset to E of Walford	Madison, Warren, Polk, Jasper, Poweshiek, Iowa, Johnson	0315	116 miles (185.6 km)
F1	E of Boxholm	Boone, Hamilton	0330	2.3 miles (3.7 km)
Minnesota
F1	SE of Trimont to SE of Grogan	Martin, Watonwan	0100	19.1 miles (30.6 km)
Source: Tornado History Project - June 7, 1953 Storm Data

June 8, 1953 event

List of confirmed tornadoes — June 8, 1953
F#	Location	County	Time (UTC)	Path length	Damage
Michigan
F4	NE of Temperance	Monroe	2315	5.4 miles (8.6 km)	4 deaths
F3	SW of Ann Arbor	Washtenaw	0030	11.3 miles (18.1 km)	1 death
F3	W of Milford	Livingston, Oakland	0030	9.1 miles (14.6 km)
F2	E of Sand Lake to N of Oscoda	Iosco	0040	16.6 miles (26.6 km)	4 deaths
F3	S of Spruce	Alcona	0108	1.8 miles (2.9 km)
F5	N of Flushing to N of Columbiaville	Genesee, Lapeer	0130	18.9 miles (30.2 km)	116 deaths
F0	SW of Caseville	Huron	0300	0.1 miles (0.16 km)
F4	N of Kings Mill to N of Port Huron	Lapeer, St. Clair	0330	33.8 miles (54.1 km)
Ohio
F4	N of Deshler to Cleveland	Henry, Wood, Sandusky, Erie, Lorain, Cuyahoga	0000	118 miles (188.8 km)	17 deaths
Source: Tornado History Project - June 8, 1953 Storm Data

June 9, 1953 event

List of confirmed tornadoes — June 9, 1953
F#	Location	County	Time (UTC)	Path length	Damage
Massachusetts
F4	W of Petersham to NE of Fayville	Worcester	2025	46.0 miles (74.03 km)	94 deaths
F3	E of West Millbury to SE of Foxborough	Worcester, Norfolk, Bristol	2130	28 miles (44.8 km)
New Hampshire
F3	SW of Exeter	Rockingham	2120	1.5 miles (2.4 km)
F1	W of South Berwick	Strafford	2200	1 mile (1.6 km)
Source: Tornado History Project - June 9, 1953 Storm Data

Flint tornado

An F5 tornado hit Flint, Michigan on June 8, 1953.^[1] The tornado moved east-northeast 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Flushing and devastated the north side of Flint and Beecher. The tornado first descended about 8:30 p.m. on a humid evening near a drive-in movie theater that was flickering to life at twilight time. Motorists in the drive-in began to flee in panic, creating many auto accidents on nearby roads. The tornado dissipated near Lapeer, Michigan. Nearly every home was destroyed on both sides of Coldwater Road. Multiple deaths were reported in 20 families, and it was reported that papers from Flint were deposited in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada, some sixty miles east of Flint. One hundred and sixteen were killed,^[2] making it the tenth deadliest tornado in U.S. history.^[3] The death toll was surpassed by the 2011 Joplin tornado.^[4] It is also one of only three F5 tornadoes ever to hit in Michigan. Another F5 would hit in Hudsonville on April 3, 1956.

Worcester tornado

The storm system that created the Flint tornado moved eastward over southern Ontario and Lake Erie during the early morning hours of June 9. As radar was still primitive (or nonexistent) in 1953, inadequate severe weather predictions resulted: the Weather Bureau in Buffalo, New York merely predicted thunderstorms and said that "a tornado may occur." As early as 10 A.M., however, the Weather Bureau in Boston anticipated the likelihood of tornadic conditions that afternoon but feared the word "tornado" would strike panic in the public, and refrained from using it. Instead, as a compromise, they issued New England's first-ever severe thunderstorm watch. Several hours later and virtually without warning (to the public at least), a strong F4 tornado struck central Massachusetts in the late afternoon hours on June 9, 1953. The tornado descended over the Quabbin Reservoir in Petersham, Massachusetts at 4:25 P.M., and was witnessed by boaters on the reservoir - 3 funnels were seen at the beginning, with rapid dissipation of 1 of them. After brushing Petersham (occasionally with twin funnels several hundred feet apart), it tracked southeastwards and slammed into the rural towns of Barre and Rutland, followed by suburban Holden, before killing 60 in heavily populated northern Worcester. The towns of Shrewsbury and Westborough each suffered numerous fatalities. The tornado did its final destruction at the Fayville post office on Route 9 in Southborough, and dissipated nearby over the Sudbury Reservoir in the Framingham area, 84 minutes after it formed.

Ninety-four people were killed. A 95th fatality has recently been brought to light: a premature baby boy delivered in the hospital elevator to his traumatically injured mother - doctors tried keeping him alive but he succumbed a day and a half later.

Coincidentally, residents of central Massachusetts were coming home from work in the minutes before impact and picked up their evening newspapers to read the front-page headlines of the tornado that had just struck Flint, Michigan the previous evening. Some wondered if it was exactly the same tornado that was now bearing down on them.

Outbreak death toll

State	Total	County	County total
Massachusetts	94	Worcester	94
Michigan	125	Genesee	116
		Iosco	4
		Monroe	4
		Washtenaw	1
Nebraska	11	Valley	11
Ohio	17	Cuyahoga	6
		Erie	2
		Henry	5
		Lorain	1
		Wood	3
Totals	247
All deaths were tornado-related

The massive Worcester tornado was on the ground for nearly an hour and a half. In that period it traveled 46 miles (74 km), reached 1-mile (1.6 km) in width and injured 1,300 people. Barre suffered the first 2 fatalities. The tornado then renewed its vigor in Rutland center with 2 more deaths, and widened to 1/2 mile in Holden, where 9 were killed outright (a 10th succumbed 2 days later), the worst-hit areas being Winthrop Oaks and Brentwood.

At 5:08 P.M., the tornado entered Worcester and grew to an unprecedented width of 1-mile (1.6 km). Damage was phenomenal in Worcester (second-largest city in Massachusetts) and in some areas equaled the worst damage in any U.S. tornado. Hardest-hit areas included Assumption College (building is now home to Quinsigamond Community College), where a priest and 2 nuns were killed. The main building's 3-foot (0.91 m)-thick brick walls were reduced by 3 floors, and the landmark tower lost 3 stories. The nearby Burncoat Hill neighborhood saw heavy devastation (especially on its western slope), but it was the Uncatena-Great Brook Valley neighborhoods to the east of Burncoat Hill that were utterly leveled, houses simply vanishing and debris swept clean from the sites. Forty people died in the Uncatena-Great Brook Valley areas alone. A 12-ton bus was picked up, rolled over several times and was thrown against the newly-constructed Curtis Apartments in Great Brook Valley, resulting in the deaths of 2 passengers. The Curtis Apartments blueprints were blown all the way to Duxbury (near Plymouth), 75 miles (121 km) away. Across Boylston St. from the Curtis Apartments, the Brookside Home Farm (a city-operated dairy facility and laundry) sustained total damage, with 6 men killed and the loss of its herd of 80 Holsteins. Houses and bodies were blown into Lake Quinsigamond. The 6 fatalities at Brookside were the most in any 1 particular building in the tornado.

The funnel maintained a 1-mile (1.6 km) width throughout much of Shrewsbury (12 killed), and was still doing maximum damage when it moved through downtown Westborough (5 deaths), where it began curving towards the northeast in its final leg. In the storm's final moments, 3 perished in the collapse of the Fayville Post Office in Southborough. Coincidentally, around the time it ended at 5:45 P.M., a tornado warning was issued, although by then it was too late. A separate F2/3 tornado also struck about the same time the warning was issued, in the nearby communities of Sutton, Northbridge, Mendon, Bellingham, Franklin, Wrentham and Mansfield in Massachusetts, injuring 17 persons. Another tornado did minor damage and caused several injuries in Fremont and Exeter in Rockingham County, New Hampshire; other smaller tornadoes occurred in Colrain, Massachusetts and Rollinsford, New Hampshire.

Baseball-size hail was reported in a score of communities affected by the Worcester supercell. Airborne debris was strewn eastward, reaching the Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory 35 mi (56 km) away, and even out over Massachusetts Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. The farthest documented distance of tornado debris was an item that blew from Holden to Eastham on Cape Cod, a distance of 110 miles (180 km). This is one of the greatest such instances in a U.S. tornado.

The Worcester Tornado was a milestone in many regards. Besides its enormous size and unusual geographic location, at the time it was the nation's costliest tornado in raw dollars. Its 1,300 injuries were the 3rd worst in U.S. history (until the 1979 Wichita Falls tornado bumped it to number 4, where it still stands). The tally of 10,000 homeless stood unchallenged for 26 years until the '79 Wichita Falls storm.

However, the Worcester Tornado's greatest effect on the nation was its being the principal catalyst for the Storm Prediction Center's reorganization on June 17, 1953, and subsequent implementation of a nationwide radar/storm spotter system. The results proved successful: since June 9, 1953, no single U.S. tornado had killed over 100 people until the Joplin, Missouri tornado of May 22, 2011.

The severity of this epic storm remained in dispute for a long period within the meteorological community. Official observations classified this tornado as F4, but damage was consistent with an F5 tornado in 5 of the affected towns (Rutland, Holden, Worcester, Shrewsbury and Westborough). As a result of this debate, the National Weather Service took an unprecedented step and convened a panel of weather experts during the spring of 2005 to study the latest evidence on the wind strength of the Worcester Tornado. The panel considered whether to raise its designation to F5, but decided during the summer of 2005 to keep the official rating as a strong F4. The reasoning for this was that the anchoring techniques used in many of the destroyed or vanished homes could never now be ascertained with certainty, and some of these structures (many of recent postwar construction) were possibly more vulnerable to high winds than older homes. Without a proper engineering qualification, it would be nearly impossible to determine with 100% accuracy which damage was F5 and which was F4, as appearances would be similar.

1953 tornado season in perspective

The year 1953 saw some of the deadliest tornadoes in U.S. history, including the Waco Tornado that hit on May 11, the Flint tornado of June 8, and the Worcester tornado on June 9. These 3 storms were also unique in occurring within a 30-day period.

Other severe tornadoes of 1953 hit Warner Robins, Georgia in April, San Angelo, Texas in May (same day as Waco), Port Huron, Michigan also in May, Cleveland in June (same day as Flint), and Vicksburg, Mississippi in December.

See also

• List of North American tornadoes and tornado outbreaks

References

• Chittick, William F. (2003). The Worcester Tornado, June 9, 1953. Bristol, RI: Private Publication.
• Chittick, William F. (2005). What Is So Rare As A Day In June: The Worcester Tornado, June 9, 1953. Bristol, RI: Multimedia Presentation.
• O'Toole, John M. (1993). Tornado! 84 minutes, 94 lives. Worcester: Chandler House Press. ISBN 0-9636277-0-8

Notes

External links

• Full map of Flint-Worcester tornado outbreak Tornado History Project
• Video interview of tornado survivor (and nurse) who tended to injured
• Beecher Tornado - Flint Public Library Archive
• Beecher Tornado - Flint Journal Beecher Tornado Anniversary
• 1953 Worcester Tornado Slideshow - City of Worcester
• Worcester Telegram and Gazette site on Worcester tornado
• The Worcester Tornado of 1953

Rank	Name (location)	Date	Deaths
1	"Tri-State" (Missouri, Illinois and Indiana)	March 18, 1925	695
2	Natchez, Mississippi	May 6, 1840	317
3	St. Louis, Missouri and East St. Louis, Illinois	May 27, 1896	255
4	Tupelo, Mississippi	April 5, 1936	216
5	Gainesville, Georgia	April 5, 1936	203
6	Woodward, Oklahoma	April 9, 1947	181
7	Joplin, Missouri	May 22, 2011	159
8	Amite, Louisiana and Purvis, Mississippi	April 24, 1908	143
9	New Richmond, Wisconsin	June 12, 1899	117
10	Flint, Michigan	June 8, 1953	116
11 - - -	Waco, Texas Goliad, Texas	May 11, 1953 May 18, 1902	114 114
13	Omaha, Nebraska	March 23, 1913	103
14	Mattoon, Illinois	May 26, 1917	101
15	Shinnston, West Virginia	June 23, 1944	100
16	Marshfield, Missouri	April 18, 1880	99
17 - - -	Gainesville and Holland, Georgia Poplar Bluff, Missouri	June 1, 1903 May 9, 1927	98 98
19	Snyder, Oklahoma	May 10, 1905	97
20	Worcester, Massachusetts	June 8, 1953	94
21	Natchez, Mississippi	April 24, 1908	91
22	Starkville, Mississippi and Waco, Alabama	April 20, 1920	88
23	Lorain and Sandusky, Ohio	June 28, 1924	85
24	Udall, Kansas	May 25, 1955	80
25	St. Louis, Missouri	September 29, 1927	79
Sources: Storm Prediction Center: The 25 Deadliest U.S. Tornadoes, SPC Annual U.S. Killer Tornado Statistics

Rank	Area affected	Date	Damage 1	Adjusted Damage 2
1	Joplin, Missouri	May 22, 2011	2800	2800
2	Tuscaloosa, Alabama	April 27, 2011	2200	2200
3	Oklahoma City Metro, Oklahoma	May 3, 1999	1000	1318
4	Hackleburg, Alabama	April 27, 2011	1250	1250
5	Wichita Falls, Texas	April 10, 1979	400	1209
6	Omaha, Nebraska	May 6, 1975	250	1019
7	Lubbock, Texas Tornado	May 11, 1970	135	763
8	Topeka, Kansas Tornado	June 8, 1966	100	676
9	Windsor Locks, Connecticut	October 3, 1979	200	605
10	St. Louis-East St. Louis Tornado	May 27, 1896	12	520
Source: Brooks, Harold E.; C.A. Doswell (Feb 2001). "Normalized Damage from Major Tornadoes in the United States: 1890–1999". Weather and Forecasting (American Meteorological Society) 16 (1): 168-76. doi:10.1175/1520-0434(2001)016<0168:NDFMTI>2.0.CO;2. http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0434(2001)016%3C0168%3ANDFMTI%3E2.0.CO%3B2.  3
1. These are the unadjusted damage totals in millions of US dollars. 2. Raw damage totals adjusted for inflation, in millions of 2012 USD. 3. A search of NCDC Storm Data indicates no tornadoes between 1999 and 2010 have caused more than $250 million in damage.