Apr 13, 2008 | 2:21 AM
Category:
Weather
In Glossary of Meteorology, tornado is defined as “a violently rotating column of air, pendant from a cumuliform cloud or underneath a cumuliform cloud, and often (but not always) visible as a funnel cloud.”
To the layman, it sounds like WAB. What A Bummer.
NOAA’s National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center says the classic belief that “warm moist Gulf air meets cold Canadian air and dry air from the Rockies” spawns a tornado is a gross oversimplification. To the shaman, it sounds like WAC. What A Crock.
“The truth,” according to the SPC, “is that we don't fully understand.”
But take it from the experts.
Else, we have to contend with such terms as convective, cycloidal, ground swirl, hook echo, mesocyclone, multiple-vortex, occlusion downdraft, and other tongue-twisters.
Tried and tested tongue-twisters, twisted sisters.
Torn the town without much ado,
that‘s the way of the tornado.
Four furious friends fought for the cellphone
while caught in the midst of a mesocyclone.
I know the two examples above sound more like doggerels than tongue-twisters. I just don’t know if the two examples below have identifiable inaudible infrasonic signatures:
A twister of twists once twisted a twist
and the twist that he twisted was a three twisted twist.
Now in twisting this twist, if a twist should untwist,
would the twist that untwisted untwist the twists?
What a terrible tongue twister.
What a terrible tongue twister.
What a terrible tongue twister.
Terrible twisters, indeed, that hit parts of North Texas last week. Images and footages of damages wrought by the tornadoes were all over the newspapers and television.
We can only commiserate with the victims. We cannot say they were unlucky for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. When you’re home, you’re always at the right place at the right time.
To us who do not have the benefit of a basement, we can only hope and pray that a tornado does not come our way. It’s hard to pick up the pieces. It’s hard literally – and even harder figuratively.
Still, tornadoes are the destructive forces of nature that we have to live with here. It goes with the territory. Tornado Alley.
Tornado touchdown is an in-your-face rim-rattling slam dunk – a la Phi Slamma Jamma, “Texas' Tallest Fraternity.”
If only we could stand our ground with hands akimbo or a la Dikembe Mutombo (with his signature taunt and transcendent move known as finger wag) and say, “No way, Jose” or “No way, Kobe.”
Not In My Back Yard. Not In Anyone’s Back Yard.
NOTE, Not Over There Either. NOPE, Not On Planet Earth.
If there would be another touchdown in our domination, let it be the kind that is capped by a popcorn celebration.
