1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,000
They are born in chaos and they bring death and destruction to our earth.

2
00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:15,000
We'd looked across the street from us and there was total devastation. It looked like a bomb had been dropped.

3
00:00:15,000 --> 00:00:22,000
They rip a path through the heavens and tear apart the fabric of our lives.

4
00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:28,000
The neighbors all gathered at my house because ours was the only house left.

5
00:00:29,000 --> 00:00:34,000
Their nature at its most terrifying. They are tornadoes.

6
00:00:46,000 --> 00:00:51,000
Beyond what is known by the unexplored world is shadows and phantoms.

7
00:00:51,000 --> 00:00:58,000
A land that knows no limits of time or space.

8
00:01:03,000 --> 00:01:11,000
From the dawn of discovery to the nightfall of catastrophe, journey through a universe of the unexplained.

9
00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:15,000
The unforeseen, the unbelievable.

10
00:01:16,000 --> 00:01:21,000
A place beyond reality where no question will go unanswered.

11
00:01:21,000 --> 00:01:27,000
A place where myths and legends are all superstition of science.

12
00:01:46,000 --> 00:01:52,000
It's time for our journey to begin.

13
00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:01,000
To a hole in fury and to no regard for the works of man.

14
00:02:04,000 --> 00:02:06,000
Tornadoes.

15
00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:09,000
Tornadoes.

16
00:02:12,000 --> 00:02:18,000
Knowledge surrounds these library walls and with these instruments that knowledge can be ours.

17
00:02:29,000 --> 00:02:34,000
Man has dedicated much time to exploiting and confining nature.

18
00:02:35,000 --> 00:02:42,000
But nature can fight back fiercely and there are few forces in nature as savage as a tornado.

19
00:02:42,000 --> 00:02:46,000
Is man helpless in the face of such wind driven rage?

20
00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:51,000
We need to take a closer look at one of those terrible winds.

21
00:02:57,000 --> 00:03:01,000
It was a foregone conclusion that we were going to die.

22
00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:04,000
It was just a matter of waiting for the exact moment.

23
00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:10,000
I can remember holding my family together in the bathroom and praying to be saved.

24
00:03:10,000 --> 00:03:15,000
As I was moving through the house I could already hear windows breaking.

25
00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:20,000
I started talking to God about whether or not I was going to make it through this experience.

26
00:03:22,000 --> 00:03:28,000
There's nothing on earth to compare to the sight and sound of this storm creature as it punches upon its helpless victims.

27
00:03:29,000 --> 00:03:35,000
People will tell you that when they sound like a train and they do, it sounds like it's going right through your home.

28
00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:41,000
The sounds were so intense, the glass breaking, the 2x4 is just snapping.

29
00:03:41,000 --> 00:03:45,000
And you realize that your house is coming apart and you're just absolutely helpless.

30
00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:50,000
You could hear things breaking, cracking, windows breaking, things hitting the house.

31
00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:54,000
And we weren't sure when we opened the door to the bathroom what we would find.

32
00:03:54,000 --> 00:03:58,000
These people have lived through a terror that descended from the heavens.

33
00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:03,000
They have experienced a tornado, an ordeal that has blown lives apart for centuries.

34
00:04:06,000 --> 00:04:11,000
In the years of the great American planes, feared and respected tornadoes,

35
00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:16,000
they believed that they could drive them from their villages with this.

36
00:04:17,000 --> 00:04:23,000
With the first sign of a tornado, they would take an axe, swing it over their heads,

37
00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:28,000
and that buried by the handle with the blade facing the menace.

38
00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:34,000
According to legend, the storm would split in two, leaving the Indians in peace.

39
00:04:36,000 --> 00:04:40,000
In the intervening centuries, our scientific knowledge has grown,

40
00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:43,000
but our ability to fight back has remained the same.

41
00:04:44,000 --> 00:04:49,000
Tornadoes sometimes touch down for just a matter of seconds.

42
00:04:49,000 --> 00:04:54,000
The tornado may destroy one or two houses and then lift right up,

43
00:04:54,000 --> 00:04:58,000
leaving the house right next to it, completely undamaged.

44
00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:09,000
The word tornado comes from the Latin word torne, meaning turn.

45
00:05:10,000 --> 00:05:15,000
And the erratic paths they take are only one of the more terrifying things about them.

46
00:05:18,000 --> 00:05:22,000
This tornado appeared in Minnesota, in the north-central United States,

47
00:05:22,000 --> 00:05:28,000
and amazingly enough, a helicopter was in the vicinity with a very brave pilot and cameraman on board.

48
00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:34,000
And they captured one of these turning winds in this spectacular footage.

49
00:05:35,000 --> 00:05:42,000
These winds can exceed 200 miles an hour, and they lay waste to everything in their path.

50
00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:45,000
Fortunately, in this case, the tornado appeared over a forest,

51
00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:50,000
and the only damage was to some power lines that were flattened like matchsticks.

52
00:05:53,000 --> 00:05:57,000
The mindless malevolence of tornadoes makes them difficult to predict.

53
00:05:57,000 --> 00:06:01,000
We do know that the United States suffers more damage than any other nation,

54
00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:05,000
with an average 850 tornadoes a year.

55
00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:08,000
And that is in a good year.

56
00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:17,000
Tornado appearances are known as outbreaks, and most take place between February and May.

57
00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:25,000
The frightening thing is that the death toll was as great in the last great outbreak of 1974 as it was in 1884.

58
00:06:26,000 --> 00:06:31,000
Modern science seems helpless in the face of something so precious,

59
00:06:31,000 --> 00:06:35,000
something that seems to appear and disappear almost at will.

60
00:06:46,000 --> 00:06:50,000
On the average, something around 100 people a year are killed by tornadoes.

61
00:06:50,000 --> 00:06:53,000
Tornadoes come in many shapes and sizes,

62
00:06:53,000 --> 00:06:56,000
and we can reproduce all those in our laboratory model.

63
00:06:56,000 --> 00:07:04,000
That's one of the advantages of the laboratory model, in that one can reproduce time and again the same airflow.

64
00:07:04,000 --> 00:07:12,000
At Purdue University in the United States, Dr. John Snow recreates tornadoes in this special chamber,

65
00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:15,000
paying close attention to their destructiveness.

66
00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:21,000
Most people who are hurt by tornadoes are hurt indirectly through flying debris.

67
00:07:21,000 --> 00:07:25,000
In a similar study conducted in the Tornado-prone state of Texas,

68
00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:33,000
researchers have attempted to duplicate the effects of these winds on a simple piece of wood blown into the slab of thick concrete.

69
00:07:33,000 --> 00:07:40,000
A chilling example of what a tornado can do took place in April of 1974.

70
00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:47,000
In a two-day period, 148 of these terrible winds descended on the east-central United States.

71
00:07:47,000 --> 00:07:53,000
In the early 1970s, the tornadoes were destroyed by the Tornado-prone.

72
00:07:53,000 --> 00:07:57,000
The tornadoes were destroyed by the Tornado-prone.

73
00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:04,000
In a two-day period, 148 of these terrible winds descended on the east-central United States.

74
00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:12,000
In the space of 16 hours, they killed 315 people and injured another 6,000.

75
00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:24,000
In a 36-hour period, there were some 140 tornadoes produced.

76
00:08:24,000 --> 00:08:31,000
This was a tornado outbreak, and that particular one was the strongest outbreak we know of in recorded history.

77
00:08:31,000 --> 00:08:35,000
This is an example of one of those violent types of tornadoes.

78
00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:41,000
It's very large, very powerful, probably having wind speeds approaching 300 miles an hour.

79
00:08:41,000 --> 00:08:44,000
As a result, it just demolishes everything in its path.

80
00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:51,000
It's almost as if man is being punished for presuming that he can control nature.

81
00:08:51,000 --> 00:09:00,000
Now that we've seen what these brutal storms can do, is there a way to fight them to push these terrible winds from the sky?

82
00:09:02,000 --> 00:09:04,000
What is the tornado?

83
00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:07,000
Very simply, it's a storm gone bad.

84
00:09:07,000 --> 00:09:09,000
Very bad.

85
00:09:09,000 --> 00:09:16,000
These killer winds' behaviors, if possessed by a malignant intelligence and like many killers, they are unpredictable.

86
00:09:29,000 --> 00:09:32,000
Tornadoes are always born in the turmoil of a thunderstorm.

87
00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:41,000
Warm, moist air pressing against dry air creates an atmospheric which is brewed that soon forms clouds, and then, as it cools, rain.

88
00:09:42,000 --> 00:09:49,000
Thunderstorms are quite common, but in rare cases, the elements collide and a tornado begins to emerge.

89
00:09:57,000 --> 00:10:01,000
Occasionally, if the storm was to come, it would be a very dangerous situation.

90
00:10:02,000 --> 00:10:16,000
If the storm keeps growing, the winds at the top of the storm begin to rotate, and if that rotation continues and tightens, that spinning vortex may become something deadly, something called a tornado.

91
00:10:19,000 --> 00:10:26,000
Can we predict the arrival of one of these rogue storms? Some meteorologists believe it may be impossible.

92
00:10:26,000 --> 00:10:37,000
It's extremely difficult. In fact, I would say it's nearly impossible to predict exactly where and when a severe thunderstorm, which might produce a tornado, would tend to form.

93
00:10:38,000 --> 00:10:52,000
So my feeling is we may be able to give 20 or 30 minutes notice for the very large tornadoes, but to be able to say that three hours from now a tornado was going to form over a certain city is absolutely impossible.

94
00:10:52,000 --> 00:10:59,000
And I would say that we probably might not be able to do that for perhaps 50 or even 100 years.

95
00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:11,000
On May 8, 1986, the small community of Edmond, Oklahoma, huddled indoors. The air was electric. Something evil was on the loose, and as the day met the evening, the time of the winds began.

96
00:11:12,000 --> 00:11:21,000
On that day we were getting signs of some impending heavy thunderstorms across Oklahoma. We were watching for indications from the National Weather Service.

97
00:11:21,000 --> 00:11:32,000
We were also listening to folks down at Severe Storms Lab in Norman, and we did have an indication of some very strong thunderstorms in the building later in the day.

98
00:11:33,000 --> 00:11:40,000
As night began to fall, so too did the winds, forming into a huge black funnel.

99
00:11:42,000 --> 00:11:50,000
Those funnels, very shortly thereafter, one of them at least touched down, became the Edmond tornado.

100
00:11:50,000 --> 00:11:57,000
That night, few slept as the winds ravaged the terrified community.

101
00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:07,000
It looked like a war zone, absolutely. There was debris four and five feet thick.

102
00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:16,000
We had both cars destroyed. Our blazer, which was just a couple days old, was thrown upside down into our front bedroom.

103
00:12:17,000 --> 00:12:21,000
We'd looked across the street from us, and there was total devastation. It looked like a bomb had been dropped.

104
00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:29,000
Edmond was completely devastated, but miraculously, no one was killed or even injured.

105
00:12:33,000 --> 00:12:40,000
I feel very fortunate we survived. In looking at the neighborhood afterwards, it's a miracle that people didn't die.

106
00:12:40,000 --> 00:12:49,000
The people that were affected completely devastated, that were right in the path of the tornado, all were astounded that no one was injured.

107
00:12:49,000 --> 00:12:54,000
That we actually came out of this alive and just happier people for it.

108
00:12:55,000 --> 00:13:00,000
The people of Edmond survived, but nobody can say for certain when another tornado will return.

109
00:13:01,000 --> 00:13:04,000
Can we predict the unpredictable? Stop the unstoppable?

110
00:13:05,000 --> 00:13:11,000
These questions are of paramount importance to millions of people who live in the area known as Tornado Alley,

111
00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:16,000
a wide strip of land that spans the central plains of the United States.

112
00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:24,000
Right at the heart of this area stands a laboratory that has joined the battle against these hellish winds.

113
00:13:25,000 --> 00:13:33,000
While most people do everything possible to stay out of the way of a tornado, scientists of this laboratory are doing just the opposite.

114
00:13:34,000 --> 00:13:39,000
We have a lot of sensors here at the National Severe Storms Laboratory that we use to make measurements in storms.

115
00:13:39,000 --> 00:13:46,000
Very important to our research are the radars, and right now the kind of radar that we use are Doppler radars.

116
00:13:46,000 --> 00:13:55,000
They are newer, somewhat different than radar we had in the past, and the way that they are different is that they add a new piece of information.

117
00:13:55,000 --> 00:14:02,000
That information, properly processed, gives you the motion of those rain drops up inside the storm.

118
00:14:02,000 --> 00:14:09,000
Knowing the air motion inside the storm, then we can learn how that storm evolves, what makes it tick,

119
00:14:09,000 --> 00:14:12,000
how does the air get flowing in the direction that it flows.

120
00:14:12,000 --> 00:14:17,000
And very important, perhaps the most important piece of information is when does it start spinning.

121
00:14:17,000 --> 00:14:24,000
Many warning given before a tornado strikes can save hundreds of lives, and that warning time may increase.

122
00:14:25,000 --> 00:14:30,000
Through the use of sophisticated atmospheric analysis and radar mapping, we may gain precious minutes.

123
00:14:30,000 --> 00:14:36,000
Time also gains through the efforts of dedicated researchers who defy the winds to do their worst.

124
00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:43,000
Today there are men and women who don't cower before the deadly wind. They seek it out.

125
00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:50,000
Why? To learn its secrets. Secrets they can share with us.

126
00:14:52,000 --> 00:14:58,000
When tornadoes strike, most rational people head for their basement. But not these men and women.

127
00:14:58,000 --> 00:15:03,000
No, they head right into the winds, risking their lives in the pursuit of knowledge.

128
00:15:04,000 --> 00:15:10,000
Storm chasers are a particular breed of person. It's actually almost inbred in you.

129
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:16,000
There's something that tells you you want to go out and chase severe thunderstorms and tornadoes.

130
00:15:16,000 --> 00:15:21,000
It sounds kind of off the wall, but there's a particular breed of us who'd love to do it.

131
00:15:21,000 --> 00:15:29,000
And we kind of derive a particular thrill of going out and seeing what is such a fleeting occurrence on the Earth.

132
00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:35,000
Okay, deploy, deploy, deploy. Let's go. I got the thing. Deploy. Yeah!

133
00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:41,000
Many of these storm chasers travel with highly sophisticated equipment, designed to measure the force of the storm.

134
00:15:41,000 --> 00:15:45,000
Equipment that forms a virtual laboratory on wheels.

135
00:15:47,000 --> 00:15:55,000
The mobile laboratory is used to move out, intercept severe and potentially dangerous storms,

136
00:15:55,000 --> 00:16:02,000
track with those storms, make measurements on those storms for future scientific analysis.

137
00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:09,000
But in the process, we would radio back-end information that might affect the public safety.

138
00:16:09,000 --> 00:16:19,000
I find that to be out in the open fields and in the presence of a very large storm is a rather awe-inspiring incident.

139
00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:29,000
You really do understand that you are an insignificant factor in front of a very large machine in the atmosphere.

140
00:16:30,000 --> 00:16:34,000
Tornado trackers are not the only people who face these winds.

141
00:16:34,000 --> 00:16:39,000
The rest of the residents of Tornado Alley must also watch and wait.

142
00:16:39,000 --> 00:16:44,000
But there are warning signs that anyone can look for.

143
00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:50,000
Obviously, violent storms can herald something unpleasant, the arrival of a tornado.

144
00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:59,000
The clouds were building and the neighbors were outside looking. We were all looking at the storm and we knew there was something to be concerned about then.

145
00:16:59,000 --> 00:17:04,000
I started weather-watching and went out on the front porch and was watching the clouds roll in.

146
00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:07,000
The more they rolled in, the darker and deeper they got.

147
00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:19,000
What I would refer to as a wall cloud is it's real black on the bottom and it's almost as if someone took a ruler and drew a line in the sky.

148
00:17:19,000 --> 00:17:24,000
It was pouring down rain like crazy. I mean, you wouldn't believe the way it was raining.

149
00:17:24,000 --> 00:17:30,000
Then we got a pea-sized hail that came shortly after that, like it was pouring out of a bucket.

150
00:17:30,000 --> 00:17:39,000
I watched the tornado form. It little wisp clouds happened to start rotating and then all of a sudden it just fell out of the sky.

151
00:17:39,000 --> 00:17:48,000
We saw it coming and we were just at God's mercy as to whether or not it was going to hit, whether or not it was going to destroy, whether or not it was going to kill.

152
00:17:48,000 --> 00:17:58,000
It is usually futile to run from a tornado, but over the years, crucial information has been gathered that has saved thousands of lives.

153
00:18:00,000 --> 00:18:11,000
The first thing that people should consider in preparing for a tornado is that there's actually very little you can do to prevent property damage in an existing building.

154
00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:15,000
So what your really goal is is to prevent injury and prevent death.

155
00:18:15,000 --> 00:18:24,000
If a tornado warning is issued, people should immediately seek shelter in a basement.

156
00:18:24,000 --> 00:18:29,000
We've got to tell them to put as many walls between themselves and the tornado as they can.

157
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:37,000
If a tornado does get close enough that it's going to start doing some damage, it's going to start tearing down the outside walls first.

158
00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:44,000
Don't stay in the car because a tornado will just tumble it over and over on the ground. Many people are killed in just that way.

159
00:18:45,000 --> 00:19:00,000
Tornadoes can destroy human lives and they can shatter the living as well, taking away their homes, their possessions, blowing their very lives to the brink of ruin.

160
00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:07,000
But out of this destruction can come hope, hope that is said to spring eternal.

161
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:17,000
A celebration of the human spirit that in its own way is as mysterious and unpredictable as the tornado itself.

162
00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:26,000
Though tornadoes take on many shapes and sizes, the human heart remains large.

163
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:35,000
People who didn't know each other became very close after the tornado because we shared something that was terrifying.

164
00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:44,000
This was Edmund Oklahoma the day after. Already the town was being rebuilt and already people were finding the strength to carry on.

165
00:19:44,000 --> 00:19:55,000
It became kind of a joke. I mean everybody started just laughing about it and with no injuries it was easy to just be thankful that you were still alive and that no one was injured.

166
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:58,000
And that we were able just to start over.

167
00:19:58,000 --> 00:20:08,000
Today Edmund is whole again. Its inhabitants as secure as they can be because on the horizon a dark cloud remains.

168
00:20:11,000 --> 00:20:20,000
Tornadoes are a reminder of how fragile the works of man are. The more we know about them the less in control of them we see.

169
00:20:20,000 --> 00:20:28,000
It's as if nature wanted to teach us humility and leave us trembling in the face of power beyond our comprehension.

170
00:20:32,000 --> 00:20:34,000
Tornadoes.

171
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:40,000
Winds that can tear the world apart.

172
00:20:51,000 --> 00:21:02,000
Secrets and mysteries presents information based in part on theories and opinions, some of which are controversial.

173
00:21:02,000 --> 00:21:13,000
The producer's purpose is not to validate any side of an issue but through the use of actualities and dramatic recreation relate a possible answer but not the only answer to this material.

174
00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:22,000
Tornadoes.