The Worst Tornado of Every Year (since 1950)

What is up everybody? Welcome back to the channel. Today we're talking about the worst tornado of every single year since 1950. That's like 80 plus tornadoes. It's a lot so please subscribe for the effort I do. So what do I mean by worst tornado? Well essentially I'm talking about like a mix of the deadliest with the most powerful. Pretty much just what's the most famous tornado slash infamous tornado of that year. Why 1950? Well 1950 is when we actually started documenting tornadoes here in the U.S. So with that said in 1950 what was the worst tornado? Well it was a pretty active year. There were several tornado outbreaks and it was a very sad year for like single home dwelling deaths unfortunately. For example the deadliest the Castor Louisiana F3 on February 12th had nine deaths but there were six deaths all within one home. The Sam and Willie Sullivan Smith family home and one of the deadliest F2 tornadoes ever recorded had eight deaths in one home which is really tragic. This was all part of a Louisiana Texas Arkansas outbreak that featured 24 tornadoes and 41 fatalities. Overall the worst tornado for 1950 though has to go to the Slack Air Force Base aka Barksdale Air Force Base F4 that occurred on February 12th. Overall there were eight fatalities but five airmen and one civilian were killed instantly when the barracks were struck along with the eight deaths there were 30 injuries. 1951 was not quite as active as 1950 but it still featured five F4 tornadoes and 34 fatalities. There were several outbreaks throughout April and May and we even have a documented tornado in the Soviet Union. If you've watched this channel you know for some reason I like Soviet tornadoes they're just interesting to me but not many people really know about that. Perhaps the most significant outbreak was the Great Lakes tornado outbreak that occurred on September 26th. There were two F4s in Wisconsin and one of these F4s tops the list for 1951 that's the Cobb Town F4 that killed six and injured three. The Cobb Town F4 mostly occurred over open farmland and while it does have an F4 rating apparently there was some evidence of F5 damage so high-end F4. In 1952 there were no F5s however there was 18 F4s a huge number one of the highest years for F4s on today's list. It was also an extremely deadly year with 230 deaths. 11 of these F4s all came with one major tornado outbreak that occurred on March 21st. At least 210 people died in this outbreak and over a thousand were injured. The worst tornado from this outbreak and the worst of the year was the Judsonia Arkansas F4 where 50 plus lost their lives. It pretty much destroyed the entire town of Judsonia. It's a very tragic event. I feel like this whole outbreak kind of gets forgotten like not many people really mention this event. As bad as 1952 was 1953 was even worse like it was it was one of the worst years ever for tornadoes. Overall 1953 had 523 fatalities a huge staggering amount of fatalities with 17 F4s and 5 F5s. There's really three tornadoes that we need to talk about when it comes to 1953. The Worcester Massachusetts F4 with 94 fatalities. This was once rated an F5 so this is you know strong F4 and it's crazy because it happened in Massachusetts. Hello the northeast is not known for massive tornadoes but they can occur obviously. Another one worth mentioning is the Flint Beecher Michigan F5 that had 116 fatalities. If this was any other year this would easily top the list but there was an even stronger tornado and that is the Waco F5 with 144 fatalities. It completely destroyed downtown Waco. 30 people died in the R.T. Dennis building alone. This year was really bad but fortunately it did lead to major changes in tornado safety. People got a little more serious about you preventing deaths during tornadic events and because of this the Waco F5 would be the deadliest tornado until Joplin in 2011 so that's good. 1954 was much calmer with 7 F4s and 36 fatalities. There was an F0 in Idaho so that's cool but the worst tornado of that year was in Nebraska. It occurred on May 30th and it was an F4 that hit the towns of Kalamazoo, Warrenville, and Eastern Norfolk killing 6 and injuring 2. 1955 was pretty active and it featured some pretty legendary tornadoes. There were two F5 tornadoes from that year both from the same outbreak the May 25th and 26th outbreak and both are pretty well known. The first one I want to talk about is the Blackwell Oklahoma F5 that has become very enigmatic and interesting to tornado enthusiasts because apparently witnesses claim that it glowed like it traveled through the fields and it was blue. This was at night it was a nocturnal tornado which is scary by itself but it glowed in the dark not because of lightning but because of like some sort of static-y St. Elmo's fire effect. Dirt was creating some sort of static electricity or something. I don't know but I'm very into this tornado because I'm really into ultra rare phenomena and unfortunately this tornado did claim 20 lives but the worst tornado of the year wasn't even the Blackwell Oklahoma tornado it was the Udaw Kansas F5 which killed 80 roughly a third of the population of the entire town. This is the deadliest tornado to have ever hit Kansas and that says a lot because Kansas is obviously known for tornadoes. 1956 was not quite as bad as 1955 but it still had 81 fatalities. There were 12 F4s and one F5. The pic for 1956 comes from the April 3rd outbreak featuring a massive long-tracked powerful F5 tornado that ripped a 60-mile path through Holland, Michigan's southern suburbs and then entered Grand Rapids leaving 17 people dead and 292 injured. Here's a photo showing clear F5 damage and Standall, Michigan. That is what F5 damage looks like just homes completely swept away off their foundations. 1956 also features an F4 that hit McDonnell Chapel and to me McDonnell Chapel is the ultimate tornado magnet. I don't know what it is about this little neighborhood town that's north of Birmingham but it has been hit so many times three times by F5 tornadoes three that's a lot that's crazy it's more of a tornado magnet than more it's more than more. Moving on to 1957 there were a few significant tornadoes there was three F5s that occurred that year that's already a lot the least known is probably the Sunfield, Illinois F5 which occurred in are you ready for this December an F5 tornado in December specifically December 18th in in Illinois like this isn't down south this is in the midwest it was a very destructive tornado but thankfully only three lost their lives also worth mentioning Italy had an F4 that killed seven another famous tornado from this year is the Fargo F5 this tornado killed 10 and it's famous because Ted Fujita documented the whole entire thing he got like photos from the event he stacked them together and he kind of made a little video of the event very famous for tornado research but the worst tornado of 1957 was actually the Ruskin Heights F5 in Kansas that killed 44. There's a photo of this tornado it's pretty terrifying looking definitely scary vibes here 1958 was slightly more tame but I mean still not a great year it had 67 fatalities with four F4s and a single F5 that F5 occurred on June 4th in Colfax Wisconsin this massive long track half mile wide F5 tornado tore through Colfax and surrounding towns killing 21 and wounding 74. Some people have given this an F4 rating so it's kind of like a weak F5 strong F4 but either way it's officially an F5 so I'm counting it as an F5. Wisconsin has been getting some pretty strong F5 tornadoes there's even more down in the list I don't know what's going on Wisconsin already has two years in the books so don't forget about Wisconsin people when we're talking about tornadic activity Anyway 1959 there were no F5s in 1959 but there were seven F4s but before we get to that we now have some sick merch here at Swiggle Studios be sure to check out the link in the description if you want some cool merch really helps out the channel and if you would like you can take a photo with your merch and I'll put it at the end of my videos but let's get back to the video. 1959 was a pretty tame year with only 58 fatalities reported in the U.S. The worst tornado of that year occurred on February 10th which is kind of a pretty early time of the year for large tornadoes. This specific tornado tore through St. Louis, Missouri crossed the Mississippi becoming a little water spout for a second and then entered into Madison, Illinois and claimed 21 lives. Unfortunately there was no tornado warning issued as forecasters were like hey it's February 10th why would there be a tornado it's too cold out there's not a tornado not a good call. We have now made it to the 1960s starting with 1960 there were 46 fatalities with a low amount of six F4s and only one F5. That F5 occurred in Oklahoma during a larger outbreak on May 5th. This struck the town of Sepulpa where five were killed. The tornado was described as being white and barrel-like so it was probably a very pretty looking tornado maybe it was backlit by the sun or something but either way it was a very deadly and dangerous tornado because a hundred homes were completely destroyed. Even that's not the worst tornado of 1960 the worst tornado goes to an F4 and that is the Wilburton, Oklahoma F4 tornado that occurred on the same day. This tornado destroyed several blocks within the Wilburton area resulting in 16 fatalities. There was also a tornado on May 20th in Poland and in the Ukraine but not much is known about this tornado. 1961 was another relatively calm year for tornadic activity with no F5s and seven F4s. Overall there were 52 deaths. The pick for 1961 is a massive and very destructive F4 tornado that struck southeast Oklahoma causing 16 fatalities and 58 injuries in Tallahanee, Rykerk, Glendale, and Howe. 1962 might be the tamest year yet so that's good we like tame years. There were 30 deaths and no F5s and only six F4s. 1962 is a bit of an interesting year as the deadliest tornado and the worst tornado of that year for this list occurred in the panhandle of Florida. It was an F3 tornado that hit Milton, Florida on March 31st. This had very little warning as you know it was in Florida people were like it's fine we don't get tornadoes. Also not a good call. This would be the deadliest tornado in Florida until 1968. I don't know what's going on with the early 1960s but they're kind of tame and 1963 was also pretty chill. There were 31 deaths and only five F4s. The southeast was very active this year. The deadliest was again an F3 that occurred on April 29th in northwest Mississippi that killed five. There were a couple F4 tornadoes in Coleman and Birmingham, Alabama. Those were some of the more powerful tornadoes of that year but they weren't quite as deadly as the one that hit Mississippi. And there was, are you ready for this, an F1 tornado in Hawaii that hit Barber's Point on March 1st. No one was killed but you know super rare of that. 1964 ends the tame streak of tornadoes for the early 60s. Overall there were 73 deaths this year and we have two major F5 tornadoes. There was a very destructive F5 that tore through central Nebraska on May 5th specifically the town of Bradshaw. Luckily there were only four fatalities. The thing about Nebraska and Iowa and Wisconsin and Illinois, they have basements and this is really important when I make this kind of list because you know you hear about these high death tolls in Mississippi, in Alabama, in Louisiana and I think it's worth noting that you know they don't have basements so the death toll is going to be higher. So I'm kind of taking that into account a little bit just a little FYI for the list. Okay another significant F5 of 1964 goes to the F5 that occurred on April 3rd and killed seven but the deadliest and the worst tornado of that year was an F4 in Louisiana. It occurred on October 3rd in La Rose, Louisiana with 22 fatalities. This was part of a larger tornado outbreak that was caused by Hurricane Hilda. So yes hurricanes can indeed produce F4 violent tornadoes. 1965 is a very infamous year in history for one specific event, the Palm Sunday tornado outbreak. It's the third worst tornado outbreak in recorded history. We'll get to the other two later. There were no F5 tornadoes during the Palm Sunday outbreak but there were, are you ready, 18 F4 tornadoes. That's an insane number and these F4 tornadoes resulted in 266 fatalities. These all occurred over the central U.S. in Indiana and Michigan. Perhaps you've seen the famous dual tornado photo captured by Paul Huffman. This was specifically of the Midway F4 but the worst of the year comes from that outbreak. It was the F4 that hit Elkhart and Dunlap, Indiana that resulted in 36 fatalities. There was also an F5 this year that many people forget about that hit Gregory, South Dakota. There were no fatalities for this F5. 1966 was a bad year for tornadoes. It had three F5s, one in Iowa, one in Topeka, Kansas and one in Mississippi. The Topeka, Kansas F5 has a very famous photo. Perhaps you've seen it. It occurred on June 8th. It's got the people running. This tornado occurred on June 8th and resulted in 18 deaths but the most significant of the year is the Candlestick Park, Mississippi F5 that occurred on March 3rd that resulted in 58 fatalities. It's the deadliest tornado of the decade and what the city it actually occurred in was Jackson, Mississippi but the name of the tornado comes from a shopping center, the Candlestick Park shopping center that took a direct hit and this tornado was so powerful that it literally pulled the pavement out of the ground easily getting our choice for 1967. My choice. No one else made this choice. 1967 was again a bad year for tornadoes here in the U.S. with no F5 tornadoes but 17 F4s. There was one major event that sticks out from the rest and that's the 1967 Oakland, Illinois tornado outbreak. This was a very tragic event with two major tornadoes. One of them caused a ton of damage in Oakland and hometown Illinois leveling numerous buildings and a lot of people and cars. This was during rush hour. They ended up perishing because cars are not safe places to be during tornadoes. Very tragic event but the worst tornado of that year occurred on the same day and that was the F4 tornado that hit Belvedere, Illinois. Unfortunately this tornado struck a bus loading area at Belvedere High School right as classes were ending and this resulted in 13 fatalities. It still remains one of the deadliest school-related tornado disasters in recorded history. Another tornado worth mentioning and perhaps this might be the worst tornado of 1967. I'm not even sure but there was actually an F5 tornado that hit France on June 24th that resulted in six deaths and dozens of injuries. There's a couple photos. I don't know much about this event but it's pretty interesting that there was an F5 tornado outside of the U.S. 1965 was bad. 1966 was bad. 1967 was bad. 1968 was yet another very bad year for tornadoes. We're going through a tough streak here. There was four F5 tornadoes recorded in the U.S. That's a lot and there were 131 fatalities. There's a very famous photo of the Tracy, Minnesota F5 that occurred on June 13th. Perhaps you've seen it. It kind of just has a very dramatic look to it. This tornado resulted in nine deaths. However, the main event of the season was a massive tornado outbreak that occurred on May 15th with 72 fatalities. The deadliest was an F4 that hit Jonesboro, Arkansas resulting in 35 fatalities and while not the deadliest, the tornado I'm picking for 1968 goes to an F5 that struck Charles City, Iowa on that same day May 15th. This tornado was extremely powerful carrying a massive path straight through the city. Very tragic event. Fortunately, there were only five fatalities because remember, Iowans have basements but still a terrible tornado. The worst of 1968. Also, Germany was hit by an F4, the Black Forest F4. So yeah, not a great year. Thankfully, 1969 was a much more tame year with only eight F4s. There is, however, a very deadly tornado that sticks out from the rest, the Hazelhurst F4 on January 23rd with 32 fatalities and 240 plus injuries. This tornado has like an urban legend attached to it. There's something called the boy with a pop bottle on his head. Apparently, some 12-year-old boy showed up before the tornado told everyone, hey, there's going to be a tornado or like something bad is going to happen to Hazelhurst just so you know and he had like a pop bottle on his head. I don't know. Anyway, the tornado came after he said that and it caused a lot of harm and then he disappeared after that. I don't know what that's all about but that's just the urban legend. Anyway, with that, we're going to move into the 1970s with 1970. 1970 was a moderate year for tornadoes with eight F4s and one F5. There's one tornado that easily sticks out from the rest just like in 1969 and it's one of the most powerful tornadoes of all time and that is the 1970 Lubbock, Texas F5 tornado that occurred on May 11th with 26 fatalities. This thing was a monster. It's predicted that it had wind speeds close to 300 miles per hour. It even had a preliminary F6 rating from Fujita. Now, obviously, F6 does not exist so it is an F5 but the fact that he questioned it and he was like, hmm, perhaps this is an F6 just goes to show how powerful that tornado was. It was so powerful that it twisted the foundation of the Great Plains life building. The remnants can still be seen today in the brick. Easily the worst tornado of 1970. Moving on to 1971, here's a map of all the tornado paths in 1971 and you can clearly see two tornadoes that stick out from the rest. That is an F4 in the blue and an F5 in the red and they pretty much follow the same path. These two tornadoes are part of a larger two-day outbreak on February 21st and 22nd that resulted in 123 fatalities. This F5 is known as the Inverness, Mississippi F5 with 48 deaths. That's quite a bit of casualties for an F5 tornado and I feel like not many people talk about this event. Maybe it's one of the forgotten F5 tornadoes but a very violent tornado, a very tragic event. Post office was gone, local bank was destroyed, the city hall was destroyed, so many homes were destroyed. There was also a lot of deaths because it primarily hit low-income housing so the buildings weren't like the most strongly built buildings ever so that's unfortunate. But fortunately after a pretty much six-year streak of bad years we get a relatively tame year in 1972 with only four F4s and 36 fatalities. Obviously 36 fatalities is not good. I'm not trying to say that those aren't bad but compared to other years this was a more tame year. This was kind of a year of rare tornadoes in unlikely locations. There was an F3 in Arizona. What? Arizona? There was another very deadly tornado that hit Florida on June 18th with six fatalities and this was also an F3 but the tornado of the year goes to the super rare Pacific Northwest Oregon-Washington F3 on April 5th. This specifically hit the cities of Portland and Vancouver. A rare tornado indeed. 1973 was a somewhat moderate year for tornadoes. There were two F5s, the Valley Mills Texas F5 on May 6th. There were no fatalities with that tornado. It hit a couple barns and apparently that was enough for the people to survey it and go yeah F5. There was also the legendary San Justo F5 in Argentina which is my pick for 1973. This resulted in 63 fatalities and apparently it was red so the buildings in this city were made of red brick and when the tornado destroyed these buildings it pulverized it into like red dust so it was a red tornado. Definitely pretty terrifying but we do need an honorable mention for 1973 and that is the Union City Oklahoma F4. It was huge for tornado research. The tornado intercept program was successful because of this event. It led to advances in radar technology and doppler technology which eventually led to longer lead times for taking shelter so yeah definitely a good tornado. Indirectly probably saved many lives but we're still sticking with the same Husto tornado for that year. Well we made it to 1974. Perhaps the worst year on record for tornadoes. One could make an argument for 2011. They were both very bad but this year has the infamous super outbreak. The largest tornado outbreak on record that occurred on April 3rd and 4th. Second largest tornado outbreak on record. I think the 2011 was actually worse but this one did have more F5s. Seven F5s. That's so many. That's that's crazy. We haven't had an F5 since 2013 and this year had seven alone. This outbreak had seven alone. The worst of the year comes from that outbreak and it's the Zena Ohio F5 with 34 deaths. This tornado just like the Lubbock Texas tornado was given a preliminary rating of an F6 by Ted Fujita with predicted wind speeds around 305 miles per hour. Truly a violent monster. Those are the only two tornadoes to ever have a preliminary rating of F6. One of the first home videos ever of a tornado was the Zena F5 captured by a 16 year old by the name of Bruce Boyd. Nixon also visited Zena and he said out of all the disasters that he had ever seen Zena was on a whole another level. Thankfully there would be no F5s in 1975 but there were still 11 F4s. That's not great. The second worst and deadliest was the March 28th Warren Arkansas F4 with seven deaths but the tornado of that year is again in Mississippi specifically Macomb on January 10th. This F4 tornado was part of the great storm of 1975. There was also a blizzard. It was a wild day in weather history. Moving on to 1976. So 1976 was kind of a good year and kind of a bad year at the same time. There was fortunately not any super deadly tornadoes but there were three F5s. The March 26th Spiro Oklahoma F5 with two deaths. The 1976 Brownwood Texas F5 with 11 injuries. The rating is a little disputed on that one. And then of course there's the Jordan Iowa F5 from June 13th of that year. I think I'm going to say the Jordan F5 tornado was the worst of that year. It didn't have any deaths but it's an extremely famous F5 tornado because Ted Fujita said it was one of the strongest tornadoes he had ever surveyed. Apparently the winds could have been over 300 miles per hour. It also had a satellite F3 tornado. Most tornadoes that they have like a satellite tornado. It's like a little F1 or something really small. This was an F3 so that's wild. So that's what I'm picking for 1976. On to 1977. It was a pretty chill year but there was one tornado that pops out from the rest and that's the April 4th Birmingham F5. This had 24 deaths and 700 injuries. This F5 has the most indirect deaths out of any tornado as the parent supercell that created this F5 tragically also caused a plane to crash. Southern Airways flight 242 with 72 fatalities. 22 did survive. The fact that there were survivors from this is pretty amazing. Also this did skim McDonald Chapel. We talked about that town earlier. Moving on to 1978. This was one of the best years for low tornado activity but this year also had the deadliest F1 tornado ever. The Whipplewheel disaster on Pomona Lake in Kansas on June 17th. 17 people died. I did a video about this. Be sure to check it out but on September 16th of that year Iowa had an F3 with six deaths and there was a tornado in India on March 10th. This doesn't have an official rating but it did have 150 deaths so either way it was a pretty tragic event. Overall the worst tornado of 1978 goes to the Whipplewheel disaster the F1 tornado on Pomona Lake in Kansas. 1979. Overall this year was moderately low with no F5s and only six F4s but there is a clear pick for the worst tornado of 1979 and that's the Wichita Falls Texas F4 on April 10th with 42 deaths. This is a pretty well known tornado. There's a lot of imagery of this tornado. Most of the deaths were vehicle related and I've said this many times. Cars and mobile homes are not safe. We also had an overpass incident which led to the overpass shelter myth but now we are entering the 80s with 1980 which was very similar in activity to 1979 with no F5s and only five F4s. In terms of death 1980 is one of the lowest on record. We love that. That's good. On May 13th in Kalamazoo Michigan an F3 was captured on camcorder. One of the first to be captured on camcorder but my pick for 1980 goes to the ultra terrifying Night of the Twisters in Grand Island specifically an F4 from that night. If tornadoes start in a horror movie it would be this event. There were seven tornadoes that hit Grand Island on the night of June 3rd. The worst being an F4 with three deaths and that was the worst tornado of 1980 in my opinion. 1981 another historic low fatality year. These come in cycles. I'm telling you there's waves of historic years and non-historic years. 1981 was also another historically low fatality year with only 24 deaths. That's very low. The F5 drought continues with 1981 but there were seven F4s. The United Kingdom had an outbreak with over a hundred tornadoes. All of them were super weak but it was still a rare weather event either way. The deadliest of the year occurred in Huntington, Ohio when an F3 took four lives but the tornado of this year goes to Wisconsin. Wisconsin is back with an F4 that took three lives in West Bend on April 4th. Things get a little more severe in 1982 and there is an F5 unfortunately the Broken Bow Oklahoma F5 on April 2nd. There were no deaths though thankfully but on that same day there was an F4 that took 10 lives in Paris, Texas. Over 460 homes were completely destroyed leaving a thousand people without a place to live. 1983 was another tame year for tornado activity. Only four F4 tornadoes. That's very low and no tornadoes killed more than three people so this is one of the best years ever for tornadic activity in terms of like good like low tornadic activity. There was a rare F4 in Reese's Corner, Ontario, Canada. This occurred on May 2nd and there were no fatalities. The deadliest was an F3 in Florida. On March 1st there was an F2 in Los Angeles. Another crazy rare weather event. No deaths officially but one newspaper did claim that there were nine deaths. Since the U.S. had a very tame year that doesn't mean that the world in general had a tame year and there was a very destructive F4 in China that killed 81 on April 27th. Things definitely ramp up in 1984 with 122 fatalities within the U.S. featuring 14 F4s and one F5. North Carolina had a rare F4 which claimed the year high of 16 lives on March 28th. Snow Hill, Winterville, Aiden, and Greenville were the largest that were impacted. This was all part of a larger Carolina outbreak. Overall the outbreak claimed 57 lives. A similar outbreak may occur once every 100 years in the Carolinas. However, the tornado of the year goes to the F5 that hit Barnveld and Black Earth in Wisconsin on June 8th. This tornado claimed nine lives and still plays a large role in Wisconsin lore to this day. This is also one of the most infamous night nocturnal tornadoes. It began at 12 40 in the morning so many were asleep. A pretty tragic event and pretty surprising considering it happened in Wisconsin. There's also like some sort of crazy lightning lore with this event. Apparently there were 200 flashes per minute creating a strobe effect. I don't know what that's all about but I love rare phenomena. Another unusual tornado occurred in 1985. The Niles, Ohio to Wheatland, Pennsylvania F5 that occurred on May 31st. This tornado had 18 deaths making it one of the most infamous F5s in history. Easily the tornado of 1985. This outbreak can easily be seen on Google Earth when looking at the scars in the forest. Moving on to 1986. For as bad as 1984 and 1985 were, 1986 was thankfully one of the most tame years on record. Only 15 lives were lost in the entire U.S. That's that's one of the lowest numbered years on record. There were no F5s and only three F4s. This is one of the lightest years we've had so far in terms of violent tornadoes. So that's good. So what was the worst of the year? Well Iowa had two F4s during two different times of the year. One in July and another in September which is pretty late for tornadoes in the Midwest. The deadliest of the year was an F2 that claimed three lives in, again, North Carolina. So we're just going to pick this F2 as the worst tornado of that year even though Iowa had the strongest. 1987 was a year of rare and strong tornadoes in unusual places. This was like the year of like tornadoes in the west. There were three major events I want to talk about. The ultra rare Grand Teton Yellowstone F4 on July 21st. This occurred at 10,000 feet above sea level which is insane. It crossed the continental divide. That's an F4 that high up is ridiculous. Thankfully there are no deaths. I'm sure a lot of animals did not fare well but in terms of humans no deaths. The other is the Edmonton Canada F4 aka the Black Friday tornado which occurred on July 31st and resulted in 27 fatalities. Depictions of this tornado are quite terrifying. It's just it's pretty photogenic and it really has that high contrast but it is pretty terrifying. The worst tornado of 1987 though is the May 22nd Saragossa Texas F4 that killed 30. The Catholic Hall of Our Lady of Guadalupe Church had 22 fatalities alone when one of the walls collapsed on the attendees. And this is in far west Texas so this isn't like your typical Texas tornado alley. This is way out to the west and this is actually the deadliest tornado of the 1980s. So clearly our pick for 1987. In 1988 things were thankfully much more tame with zero F5s and three F4s. Riley North Carolina had the worst tornado of 1988 with an F4 late in the year on November 28th that claimed four lives. North Carolina has been all over this list in the past couple of years. Moving on to 1989. 1989 was a moderate year for tornadic activity featuring 11 F4s and 50 fatalities. There are two tornadoes that we need to specifically talk about. A very deadly F1 which could have actually been a downburst the Caldingham Elementary School disaster where a wall collapsed claiming nine lives on November 16th. But the worst tornado of the year was the 1989 Huntsville Alabama F4. Surprisingly it's actually part of the same outbreak as the Caldingham Elementary School disaster even though they're pretty far apart. This F4 claimed 21 lives. 12 of the 21 deaths occurred in cars during rush hour. Moving on to the 90s a new decade featuring many terrifying and deadly tornadoes. In 1990 we had quite a large amount of F5 tornadoes. Two F5s were in Kansas but the worst tornado of 1990 goes to the Plainfield Illinois F5 on August 28th which claimed 28 lives. The only F5 recorded in the month of August ever and the only one to hit the greater Chicago area. This is kind of a tornado lost media event as there are no known videos of the Plainfield F5. If you have video of this if you're sitting on a VHS tape please upload it. I mean it's pretty crazy that there is no footage of this because Andover which we'll get to next year there's so much footage of that. This is kind of the time where everyone had camcorders and it was kind of a novelty you know the early 90s and no one got video of this. And it happened during the day so I don't know why no one got video of this. Speaking of Andover though that is the tornado of 1991. A clear pick as the worst tornado too and it's really one of the most infamous of all time. It occurred on April 26th and claimed 17 lives. There are so many videos of this including the famous Duke Evans video and also the famous McConnell Air Force Base video. Truly insane footage. Moving on to 1992. 1992 had a slow start but a relatively active summer for tornadic activity. There was only one F5 in 1992 and that was the Chandler Lake Wilson Minnesota F5 on June 16th. This tornado claimed one life however the worst tornado of 1992 occurred on November 21st. The Hopewell Florence Pine Tree Weir Mississippi F4 with 12 deaths. Eight of the 12 fatalities were in mobile homes. Also an honorable mention to the Buka tornado in Australia that occurred on November 29th. This is the strongest tornado to have ever occurred at least in recorded history in Australia. 1993 was a pretty chill year overall with no F5s and only six F4s. There were 100 injuries and seven fatalities from an F4 that struck Catosa Oklahoma. This would be the deadliest tornado and my pick for the worst tornado in 1993. 1994 has a very clear pick for the worst tornado of that year. It's another F4 that occurred on March 27th over Piedmont Oklahoma resulting in 22 deaths. This also occurred on Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday does not have a great reputation for tornadoes. This is the deadliest tornado since Plainfield. 20 out of the 22 fatalities actually occurred inside one building the Goshed United Methodist Church. This was due to a collapsed stone wall. It's a very tragic tornado story that I feel like not many people know about. Georgia was also hit pretty hard that day. Thankfully 1995 was a pretty tame year. There was a decent amount of F4s though. 2011 and there was an F3 in Ireland. I should have mentioned that in my out of place tornado video but I did not. This is Ireland's strongest tornado on record. There was also a significant tornado in tornado research history. The Dimmitt Texas F2 tornado. It was the first for tornado researchers as they were able to capture the entire process of the tornado, its formation, the tornado genesis if you will. The worst tornado of 1995 may have been the Great Barrington Massachusetts F4 claiming the lives of three individuals. A rare tornado but as we know Massachusetts does get some tornadoes from time to time. However I think the most well-known tornado of 1995 and my pick for 1995 is actually going to be the Pampa Texas F4 just due to the insane footage of this beast. Surprisingly this tornado did not claim any lives. On to 1996 we have an F5 in 1996. I feel like we've been on a bit of an F5 drought here but this F5 surprisingly again occurred in Wisconsin. Specifically Oakfield Wisconsin on July 18th. There's thankfully no deaths though so that's good. The deadliest tornado and the worst tornado of that year occurred on April 16th in Arkansas. This was an F4 that took the lives of seven people in Mountain View. Starting in 1997 we start to get a string of bad years. 1997 featured one of the most infamous tornadoes of all time and my pick for the year the Gerald Texas dead man walking F5 on May 27th. One of the strongest tornadoes ever recorded. There were 27 fatalities making it one of the deadliest of the 1990s as well. Homes were completely swept off their foundation. This right here is some of the clearest F5 damage I've ever seen. Unfortunately the tornado was extremely slow so it just sat on top of the Double Creek Estates subdivision. This is where all the fatalities occurred. 1998 had another infamous F5 which is my pick for the worst of that year. The Birmingham Alabama F5 on April 8th with 32 deaths. McDonnell Chapel was hit during this tornado. Also Florida had one of its deadliest tornadoes on record an F3 that took 25 lives on February 22nd. 1998 also has one of the most forgotten about F5s. I don't remember which one it was though. It was in Tennessee. 1999 we all know what the worst tornado of 1999 was because it's one of the most infamous and worst tornadoes of all time. It's literally the most powerful tornado on record with wind speeds over 300 miles per hour. I'm of course talking about the May 3rd Bridge Creek Moore F5 tornado with 36 fatalities. There is great coverage from this from both Gary England and Mike Morgan. I highly suggest you watch it but it was the first event to issue a tornado emergency. There are tons of videos online about this so we're going to move on. That brings me to the 2000s. In 2000 we had one of the lowest years on record in terms of violent tornadoes with only three F4s. One in Tuscaloosa Alabama, one in Zena Ohio, and one in Granite Falls Minnesota. For 2000 it's a pretty clear pick and that is the December 16th Tuscaloosa F4 with 11 deaths and 125 injuries. In a way this tornado kind of dodged Tuscaloosa. It went south of Tuscaloosa so it could have been worse but still a tragic event and this was also captured live by ABC 3340 with James Spann. So this is like the precursor to the famous 2011 footage with James Spann. This is kind of the original version of that. If you haven't seen it you should check it out. The worst tornado of 2001 again goes to the deep south but instead of Alabama it's Mississippi with an F3 that occurred on February 25th that resulted in six deaths and destroyed 300 plus homes and numerous businesses. Another chill year in 2002. We're kind of going through a season of low tornadic activity but in 2002 there was a tornado emergency for an F3 that passed near Indianapolis on September 20th. Thankfully it missed and there were no fatalities but this is the first tornado emergency after Oklahoma in 1999. The deadliest tornado of that year is in Tennessee. I feel like Tennessee has been lacking on this list. I love you Tennessee and you're going to be in a lot of the years coming up just FYI. But there was an F3 on November 10th and this was part of a 2002 Veterans Day tornado outbreak which also featured my pick for the worst of this year the Van Wert F4 tornado. Scott Schaefer an absolute legend at the Van Wert cinema saved dozens of lives when he literally went in right before the tornado hit told everyone to seek shelter and then after they got out of the shelter there were cars found like in the auditorium in the movie theater seats. So Scott is a legend. Moving on to 2003 things begin to pick up a little bit. Still no F5s but we do have a F4s. There was a huge outbreak sequence in early May with 363 tornadoes and six F4s. This is one of the largest outbreak sequences on record. The outbreak intensity score was 232 making it the fourth worst in recorded history. The worst tornado of that year comes from this outbreak sequence. The Denmark to Johnson to Oak Grove to Westover Northwestern Lexington Tennessee F4 on May 4th with 11 fatalities. Moore Oklahoma was also hit by an F4 on the same day. People often forget about the 2003 Moore F4 because you know they're so distracted with the 1999 and the 2013 F5s but still Moore is definitely a tornado magnet. 2004 was both tame and extremely active at the same time. Technically speaking 2004 holds the record for the most tornadoes in a single year with 1,817 tornadoes. That's a huge number but it's also kind of a tame year because by far most of them were extremely weak. In fact there were only 25 fatalities in 2004 which is one of the lowest numbers on today's list. One tornado in Bangladesh did claim 111 lives on April 14th. There's not much data on this tornado so there's not like an official score but there could have been an F5 on May 12th in Harper Kansas. It's officially an F4 but one farmhouse did seem to show F5 damage. The tornado of the year however goes to the Halam Nebraska tornado on May 22nd. One of the largest tornadoes ever recorded. Just look at this beast. This is two and a half miles wide. This used to hold the record as the largest tornado ever documented. No longer does and we'll talk about that later but still pretty legendary tornado. While 2004 had tons of tornadoes, 2005 is actually one of the weakest on today's list in terms of violent tornadoes with only one F4. One F4 that's crazy and one F3 is easily the pick for 2005. In fact this is the deadliest single tornado in years. It occurred over Kentucky and Indiana on November 6th resulting in 24 deaths. The largest reason for the high fatality is the fact that it occurred in the middle of the night. Most of the death and destruction occurred in Evansville, Indiana and there's only one photo of this tornado so there's a little bit of lost media here. 20 deaths alone occurred in the Eastbrook Mobile Home Park. If you're taking anything from this video it's that mobile homes are not safe for tornadoes. 2006 was another weak year for violent tornadoes as there were only two F4s. The worst and deadliest is again in Tennessee on April 2nd. 16 were killed in a tornado that struck Lenox and New Bern. Japan had a terrible year though. On September 18th 3 were killed in a tornado which was like a new record but then literally a few months later that record was broken on November 7th when 9 were killed in the tornado. So I was surprised to find that tornadoes occur in Japan but I mean you got earthquakes and tsunamis and tornadoes yeah and a volcano. So 2000 through 2006 was a time of mild activity. It was the first I made that up. Unfortunately that all ends in 2007. In 2007 we enter another tornado dark age that will last until like 2013 starting with the infamous Greensburg EF5 on May 4th. By the way this is the first EF5. Greensburg was wiped off the map like look at this like the entire town was completely destroyed and 11 people were killed. Dave Freeman from KSN did some excellent coverage of this event. I highly recommend that you watch it. It's very well done but there was another EF5 in Isley Manitoba on June 22nd. This is a pretty famous EF5 in fact it's one of the most famous tornadoes of all time and it had zero fatalities. In my opinion this is kind of the greatest the goat tornado kind of because it's so photogenic there were no fatalities. Technically it's an EF5. I don't know there's some controversy some people think it was just like a novelty EF5. I don't know but apparently the winds were pretty strong and they had damage to prove it so but Greensburg was the worst of that year. In 2008 we have a very bad year for tornadoes. In fact this is the deadliest year since 1998 with 126 fatalities. We have numerous tornadoes to mention. There was the February Super Tuesday outbreak from Texas all the way up through Ohio. The deadliest was an EF4 with 13 deaths. On that same day another EF4 hit Sumner County Tennessee resulting in 22 deaths. Another EF4 occurred on May 10th this time in Pitcher Oklahoma. Perhaps the most remembered of that year is the EF5 that struck Parkersburg Iowa on May 25th resulting in nine deaths. Iowa had a bad year in 2008 because there was also the Little Suess Boy Scout tragedy in western Iowa on June 11th that resulted in four deaths. This was just a bad year overall. There are so many options for worst of the year I kind of bounce between a few but I'm actually going to say the EF5 that hit Parkersburg. It wasn't the deadliest but it was definitely the most infamous from that year and the strongest. No EF5s in 2009. We get a little bit of a break but there were six EF4s so a moderately low year in terms of violent tornadoes. The worst though was in Lone Grove Oklahoma. This EF4 killed eight on February 10th. Six of those deaths occurred in mobile homes. One was in a house and another was a motorist who got hit when the tornado crossed I-35. Moving on to 2010. It was overall a pretty bad year with 13 EF4s so one of the highest numbers we've seen in a while. However there were only 45 fatalities so it's kind of a moderately low year. One tornado does stick out from the rest and that was an EF4 that hit Louisiana and Mississippi on April 24th with 10 deaths. This tornado was a beast. It was almost two miles wide making it one of the largest in recorded history and this track was over 150 miles making it one of the in tornadic history. Yazoo City Mississippi was one of the hardest hit communities and if you know anything about Yazoo City you know that it doesn't have the greatest tornado reputation. All right we've made it to the other massive year. There's 1974 and then there's 2011. An argument can be made about both of them. Both of them were terrible years. Extremely strong tornado years. Both were the worst years of all time well since 1950. There were six EF5s and 17 EF4s resulting in 553 fatalities making it the second deadliest on record and the deadliest since 1950. There were two major events that we need to talk about the April 27th super outbreak over the southeast as well as the May 22nd Joplin EF5. The worst tornado of the super outbreak was the Heckelberg Campbell EF5 with 72 deaths making it the deadliest in Alabama history. The ground scoring from this tornado is insane if you've ever seen pictures of it. But the worst of the year easily goes to Joplin Missouri on May 22nd. This EF5 resulted in 158 deaths making it the deadliest since Woodward Oklahoma in 1947. So the deadliest and really the worst tornado on today's list is the Joplin EF5. 4,400 homes were destroyed. I can't even wrap my head around that. That's that's insane. Also it's the costliest tornado of all time. Definitely a tragic event. One of the worst tornadoes ever recorded. In 2012 thankfully there were no EF5s. In fact there were only four EF4s so it was a pretty low year. The worst was a stovepipe EF4 that struck New Perkin, Henryville, Marysville, and Chelsea on May 2nd. This resulted in 11 deaths. There was also a massive supercell that caused a lot of hail in Hawaii. So crazy weather event there. 2013 is another infamous tornado year. Three events of course come to mind. The Hattiesburg Mississippi EF4 on February 10th. So many of these terrible tornadoes have occurred on February 10th. I'm just now noticing that. Yeah not a good day. The El Reno EF3 is considered the largest tornado of all time. It was 2.6 miles wide and it occurred on May 31st in El Reno, Oklahoma. Unfortunately it resulted in eight fatalities including the Twistex team of storm chasers. If there was ever a tornado with a disputed rating it would probably be this one. Wind speeds were estimated to be over 300 miles per hour making it one of the most powerful tornadoes ever recorded but still only got an EF3 because thankfully it didn't cause much damage. Like we should be thankful that it's an EF3 and that it didn't hit anything. If this went through El Reno that would be, I mean it would be an EF5 but it would be extremely tragic. But this isn't the worst tornado of 2013. The worst goes to the May 20th New Castlemore EF5 with 24 fatalities. It's one of the most infamous tornadoes of all time and also the last EF5 recorded as of making this video which is crazy. I mean that was over 10 years ago. So 2014 did not have any EF5's obviously but it did have the day of the twins. One of the most famous tornado events in history where there were two twin EF4 tornadoes over Pilger, Nebraska on June 16th. One of the rarest meteorological events ever. These two are sharing the spot for 2014. You can't separate them. However the deadliest tornado was on April 27th in Arkansas where 16 would lose their lives. Moving on to 2015 this is the year of international tornadoes. There was a massive IF3 international Fujita, by the way this is a scale, wedge tornado in Germany on May 5th. Also Italy saw an IF4 on July 8th. The most remembered was probably the Rochelle, Illinois EF4. That's the one that comes to mind when I think of 2015. But the worst was a tornado the day after Christmas in Texas that claimed 10 lives. So 2016 was a very tame year for tornadoes which is great. Only 18 lives were lost in the U.S. making it one of the lowest ever recorded. There were only three EF4s. Unfortunately that is not the case for the world in general which brings me to the worst tornado of 2016. The Jiangsu tornado in China on the 23rd of June with 99 deaths and almost 100 injuries. I don't really know much about this event but that EF4 rating was actually given by the China Meteorological Administration the CMA. I was surprised to find out that they used the Fujita scale. Pretty cool but not cool that that happened. That was not good. There were only two EF4s in the U.S. in 2017. Extremely low number. However the worst tornado came from an EF3. Specifically the Barney Adele Nashville, Georgia EF3 which happened on January 22nd and resulted in 11 deaths. This was a pretty bad year for Georgia. There was an outbreak that had several other EF4s. One that claimed five lives and one that claimed four lives. 2018 is the greatest year ever in terms of like tornadic activity. This is the least active year on today's list and one of the least active ever recorded with only 10 lives lost in the U.S. That's really low. I mean think about that only 10. I mean it's tragic that 10 lives were lost but that's good overall. Also no EF4s in the U.S. this year. Brazil and Canada did have EF4s though. The deadliest tornado of the year only had two deaths and it was in Maryland on November 2nd when an EF1 collapsed a wall on some employees at an Amazon warehouse. Marshalltown and Pella, Iowa saw probably the costliest and most powerful tornadoes in the U.S. that year. They're both EF3s but the worst tornado of that year has to go to a violent EF4 over rural Manitoba, Canada on August 3rd. 2019 was a very active year in some ways and a very tame year in other ways. Technically 2019 is the fourth most active year on record with 1,676 tornadoes recorded in the U.S. This is slightly misleading because back in the day you know they didn't have the technology to record every single tornado. Like now we can see just a little blip and we'll be like oh my gosh EF0 oh there's 20 EF0s boom. Back in 1951 there was no way that they could record these tornadoes. So it's a bit misleading but there were five EF4s in 2019 although one was in China and one was in Cuba. The worst was easily the Beauregard tornado in Alabama with 23 fatalities on March 3rd. So in 2020 things begin to pick up again with six EF4s and 78 fatalities in the U.S. There's a very clear and obvious pick for the worst tornado of 2020 and that is the Cookville, Tennessee nocturnal EF4 on March 3rd. This tornado occurred at 2 a.m. in the morning. Another terrifying night tornado. It claimed 19 lives. This was just shortly after a long track EF3 that tore through the northern part of Nashville that claimed five lives. There's that famous crane tower footage if you've ever seen it. This specific EF3 is actually one of the costliest on record since it went through such an urban area. It caused 1.5 billion USD in damage ranking at six of all time. But the Cooksville, Tennessee EF4 with 19 deaths is the worst of 2020. 2021 could really go to two different tornadoes. The first being a rare international IF4 that struck South Moravia in the Czech Republic on June 24th. This super rare European tornado claimed six lives and it's the deadliest European tornado since 2002. But the strongest and the worst tornado of the year, I'm sure most of you know I'm gonna say, it definitely goes to the Western Kentucky aka Mayfield, Kentucky EF4 on December 10th. Yet another nocturnal tornado that claimed 57 lives making it the deadliest in the U.S. since Joplin in 2011. It lasted three hours and went over 170 miles. For a while there they thought it was the longest ever recorded but then they found out it was actually multiple tornadoes. But it really might be one of the longest ever recorded because the tornado that does hold that record, the Tri-State Tornado, that was in 1925. We don't know if that was a continuous tornado so this could be the longest track tornado of all time. And this EF4 rating, it is highly controversial. Some believe it should have been an EF5. The hardest hit community was Mayfield where 22 had lost their lives. 2022 started off really active, in fact it's one of the most active early tornado seasons on record. The month of March alone has the record for being the most active in terms of tornadic activity. But the year as a whole was pretty moderate to low. While it did start off really strong, it kind of just tapered out throughout the rest of the year. There were low fatalities for 2022 which is good with only 23 recorded here in the U.S. But the deadliest and my pick for the worst of 2022 was the Winterset, Iowa EF4 where six lost their lives on March 5th. Thankfully this tornado mostly hit rural areas but unfortunately pretty much every house that it did happen to hit there was unfortunately a fatality. Iowa had one of the few EF4s of 2023. There were only three EF4s recorded in 2023 which is super low. But we got to talk about the Rolling Fork, Mississippi EF4 on March 24th with 17 fatalities. Yet another highly controversial tornado rating, it's currently considered a high-end EF4 with estimated wind speeds around 195 miles per hour, just five miles per hour short of an EF5 rating. There's lots of rating controversy with this one, just look at that damage. Some claim this is an EF5 level damage and there was also ground scoring which is you know only occurs during the strongest tornadoes. But regardless of the rating it was still a very tragic event, a very tragic day in tornado history. So don't get too caught up in the ratings. Okay I know people sometimes want strong ratings but we don't want strong ratings. And with that said we have made it to this year 2024 with only three EF4s so far. It seems like been a pretty active year and it has been a pretty active year. But only three EF4s, I mean I guess it's only June so it's still pretty early. Those three EF4s were in Marietta Oklahoma on April 27th, Barnesdale Oklahoma on May 6th, and Greenfield Iowa on March 21st. There was that very famous Lincoln Nebraska I-80 EF3, one of the most photogenic tornadoes I've ever seen. It kind of just barely dodged Omaha. It like hit new houses on the edge. Also Bartlesville Oklahoma also kind of dodged a bullet. It did technically get hit but it was when the tornado was dissipating. But hopefully my list stays accurate for the rest of the year and that there's no new worst tornado of 2023. That was a long video. What are your thoughts? What tornadoes would you replace with my tornadoes? Some of them were hard to pick honestly like it could have gone either way. But with that said, thank you so much for watching and we'll see you in the next video.