Earliest Tornado And
Waterspout
The earliest tornado known in Britain is also the equal severest
on record. The violent (T8) tornado hit
St. Mary le Bow in
central London on October 23, 1091
.
Further details
about this tornado are given under the "Most intense tornado"
below.
Artist's impression of the Rosdalla tornado (
Chris
Chatfield
).
The earliest tornado known in Europe occurred at
Rosdalla,
near Kilbeggan (Co. Westmeath) in Ireland
on
April 30,
1054
. Some violent squalls which may be tornadic are known
from before 1000, but evidence of conclusive (or even probable)
tornadoes is lacking.
Artist's impression of the waterspouts in 1233 (
Chris
Chatfield
).
The earliest-known British waterspouts (there were actually
two) are also the earliest known in all of Europe; these occurred
off southern England
in
June 1233
.
Longest-Track Tornado
On
May 21, 1950
,
a tornado which touched-down at
Little London (Buckinghamshire)
tracked 107.1 km to
Coveney (Cambridgeshire)
. From there it continued as a
funnel cloud, travelling another 52.6 km to
Shipham
(Norfolk)
where it was last seen disappearing out across the
North Sea (and hence the distance travelled as a funnel is the
absolute minimum). Reports are sufficiently frequent from the
many villages along this T5-6 tornado's track to indicate that it
probably was caused by a single tornado, rather than a series of
individual tornadoes.
On the continent, the tornado with the longest reported track
also happens to be the earliest-known tornado in
France
.
It occurred overnight during the
September of 1669
,
tracking from
La Rochelle (Charente-Maritime)
to
Paris
-
a length of 400 km. This is also likely to be a minimum distance,
as it is quite possible that the tornado commenced as a
waterspout over the Bay of Biscay. However, the antiquity and
lack of data available to TORRO raises questions as to the
continuity of the track; it is perfectly possible for several
individual tornadoes to have been responsible for what may have
been an discontinuous track.
Widest Tornado Path
Artist's impression of the Fernhill Heath tornado (
Chris
Chatfield
).
A tornado on
September 22, 1810
(T4) at
Fernhill
Heath (Hereford & Worcester)
had a path width varying
between 805 m and 1,609 m (converted from the reported 0.5 to 1
mi); however there is the possibility of the upward-rounding of
the figures, given the reported values and the units used. The
tornado of
July 4, 1946
(T2) which hit
Fairlight
(East Sussex)
had a width of 1,207 m (converted from
reported 0.75 mi), while in this case only one figure was
quoted.
The widest-known tornado in Europe occurred on
June 3,
1902
, at
Javaugues (Haute- Loire), France
. Although
the path length was only 7 km, it was 3,000 m wide and the
tornado had an intensity of T6-7. Remarkably, only one person was
killed by the tornado, which occurred at 1400 GMT.
Several European countries have been affected by tornadoes
with paths over 1,000 m wide; some nations have been hit a number
of times by such massive tornadoes.
Most Intense Tornado
Artist's impression of the St. Mary le Bow tornado
(
Chris Chatfield
).
Two tornadoes in Britain are known to have reached T8; their
antiquated nature (especially of the one) necessitated great
caution in assigning intensities, so it is possible that they may
have been even stronger. The first, also Britain's earliest known
tornado, occurred on
October 23, 1091
. The church at
St. Mary le Bow in central London
was badly damaged,
with four rafters - each 7.9 m long (converted from the reported
26 ft) - being driven into the ground (composed of heavy London
Clay) with such force that only 1.2 m (converted from the
reported 4 ft) protruded above the surface. Other churches in the
area were demolished, as were over 600 (mostly wooden) houses. On
December 14, 1810
, another T8 tornado tracked from
Old Portsmouth to Southsea Common (Hampshire)
also
causing immense damage - although no deaths, it is believed. Some
houses were completely levelled and many others were so badly
damaged that they had to be demolished; chimneys were blown down
and the lead on a bank roof was "rolled up like a piece of canvas
and blown from its situation".
Artist's impression of the Montville tornado (
Chris
Chatfield
).
Across the continent, a number of tornadoes are believed to
have reached T10 - although it is always difficult to rate
violent tornadoes, especially those at the upper end of the
category. Violent (T8-T11) tornadoes have occurred in many
countries, although only a few nations have experienced a T10.
However, two tornadoes are rated T10-11 with the upper category
implying windspeeds close to the 500 km h-1 (311 mi h-1) mark. On
August 19, 1845
,
a violent T10-11 tornado devastated
Montville (Seine-et-Maritime) in France
. Sources give
conflicting information as this lunch-time tornado travelled 15
or 30 km, was 100 or 300 m wide and killed 70 & injured 130
or (less probable) killed 200 people. At a similar time of day on
July 24, 1930
, the
Treviso-Udine area (Veneto /
Friuli-Venezia Giulia) of Italy
was devastated by a 80 km
long T10-11 tornado, which claimed 22 or 23 lives.
Most Deadly Tornado /
Waterspout
Artist's impression of the Tay Bridge waterspouts (
Chris
Chatfield
).
On
December 28, 1879
, all 74 lives were lost when a
passenger train plunged from the
Tay Bridge (Tayside)
into the Tay Estuary, when the middle section of the bridge
collapsed. Although the bridge was poorly constructed and had
already been weakened in earlier gales (including the
pre-existing winds at the time of the tragedy), the ultimate
failure is believed to have been caused by two or three
waterspouts which were sighted close to the bridge immediately
before the accident.
Artist's impression of the Valetta waterspout - tornado
(
Chris Chatfield
).
Great loss of life has been caused by tornadoes and
waterspouts across Europe. On
September 23, 1551
(or
1556
, date not reported
- sources conflict), the
Grand Harbour at Valetta, Malta
, was hit by a waterspout
which then moved to land and caused T7 damage. A shipping armada,
which had assembled there and was about to go into battle, was
destroyed by the waterspout killing at least 600 people. It is
not known how many recovered from their injuries.
Artist's impression of the Sicily tornadoes (
Chris
Chatfield
).
It was reported that in
December 1851
two tornadoes
crossed the western tip of
Sicily, Italy
, killing over
500 people, but details on this event are lacked by TORRO. On
June 9, 1984
, over 400 were killed and 213 injured when
a T10 tornado hit
Belyanitsky, Ivanovo and Balino in western
Russia
.
Largest Tornado Outbreak
The largest tornado outbreak in Britain is also the largest
tornado outbreak known anywhere in Europe. On
November 23,
1981
,
105 tornadoes were spawned by a cold front in the
space of 5.25 hours. Excepting Derbyshire, every county in a
triangular area from
Gwynedd to Humberside to Essex
was
hit by at least one tornado, while Norfolk was hit by at least
13. Very fortunately most tornadoes were short-lived and also
weak (the strongest was around T5 on the TORRO Tornado Scale) and
no deaths occurred.
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