The moment you cut yourself off with the "Tornado Warning" emergency screen and the subsequent display of flashes of that monster tornado truly freaked me the hell out. Brilliant, man.
And the music was just the cherry on top, tornadoes at night are one of the things that scare me the most and I don’t live in an area where tornadoes happen often to begin with.
Actually, from what storm spotters stated from when The Weather Channel covered this tornado. It could've been larger than what people saw. The narrator said something of the lines of. "The tornado was so large not even lightning could evoke it's true size." A 1.8 mile potentially even 2-mile-wide tornado is just ridiculous.
As a truck driver, I have driven through Greensburg many times. I saw the damage firsthand and saw the recovery on subsequent trips. As you stated, the town has been completely rebuilt which is a living testament to their strength and resolve.
@@jeffbryan4019 it reminded me of Xenia too, since I grew up in Beavercreek, Ohio which borders Xenia. I remember the tornado flew over Beavercreek and touched down in Xenia. I remember it well being that I was 10 years old at the time. My mom drove us through Xenia about 3 weeks after the tornado. The place looked like a war zone.
You have hit on the biggest weakness of the Fujita Scale. Unless a tornado passes through a populated area, there is much less damage left behind upon which to determine the intensity. The El Reno, Oklahoma tornado is a perfect example. While the winds in this monster were directly measured by a mobile Doppler radar at over 300 mph, the tornado was only rated as an EF3 because it mainly affected a sparsely populated area. I have absolutely no doubt that the El Reno tornado was an EF5, but the NWS has to be consistent or else the records of past tornado strengths will mean nothing. I have a firm belief that one day, the wind speeds of every tornado will be measured directly and will result in much more accurate records. The ratings of tornadoes using the F and EF scales will be called into question, and the two rating systems will be non comparable.
It literally seems anti-scientific to not look at actual strength objectively. Do officials say a magnitude 7.0 earthquake isn't one just because it didn't damage any buildings? It's time to retire this whole F/EF-scale BS. It served its purpose, and mad respect to Dr. Fujita, but let's progress.
Honestly I'm with you on a lot there but really a damage-based scale is the best we've got right now for accurately and consistently determining tornado strength. Its not like we can just wheel out a radar truck to scan every tornado that ever happens. How else could we rate these tornadoes if not by looking at what they did? Maybe its not the most accurate scale but it's literally all we have right now. IIRC Tim Marshall and a large group of engineers/grad students/etc are working on a new version of the EF scale that looks to be a complete overhaul of the current scale, going way way deeper than the current EF scale already does.
@@gabepena2868 after thinking about I understand why it’s rated by damage, but scientifically rating them by wind speed and intensity would probably help, for example, let’s say a super powerful wedge hits farmland and gets an ef1. Two meteorologists talk about it. X: yo dude did you hear about ef1 earlier while you were on vacation Y: nah bro, it’s just an ef1 X: nononoono it was a wedge, mann super important Y: Show me brooo Like, rating it by intensity would most likely help with research, I’m really bad at explaining things, so I hope you understand Edit: it would help with studying patterns when looking at official meteorology records
Marshall is working on enhancing the scale to consider more damage Gabe is right. Hopefully the team working on the upgrades will be done sooner rather than later to start getting more “accurate” ratings. Here’s a news story on it: th-cam.com/video/wXrCLWVhKLE/w-d-xo.html
About a week after the storm my high school's 4H club shipped several busses of students over to help with the cleanup. we spent most of the day just wandering a field north of town pulling out whole sheets of metal roofing material and 2x4s that had buried themselves, and winding up what felt like miles of barbed wire. The thing that never gets talked about after the big ones is how windy it gets in town afterwards, when there's no trees or buildings to act as windbreaks.
Friends and family commented similarly after 1974 Xenia, Ohio, tornado. Our friends had a silver maple survive. City came through to trim off damage parts. Tree lived another 25-30 years until removed by another homeowner. A drive down USR 35 bypass show clearly the path the tornado look: trees, nothing, then trees again. My chiropractor related a similar story when he was driven by a family friend who was a state trooper at the time.
I visited Greensburg in mid-February for the first time. I’ve known about this tornado since it happened but to see the town itself with my own eyes was surreal. I ended up running into a local politician who gave us a tour of some of the public government buildings in the town and took us to a great diner. It was purely amazing hearing the stories of the people there, how tight-knit they are, and how involved everyone is in the community. Truly one of the most amazing towns I have ever visited.
One thing you don't mention is that the 15 minutes of immediate emergency warning was spent by neighbors with basements gathering in their basementless neighbors and many other such actions that cut the death toll a third.
@@poetcomic1 In the plains states not all houses have basements, esp. older houses before 1970. It just was not necessary. Why they did that, IDK. If you have a slab foundation house you're pretty well fucked in a tornado unless you're rich enough to have a bunker. I've seen poorer people dig ramps in their yard and then back a school bus into the pit and re-enforce the insides and put dirt over the whole bus in a mound to make a tornado shelter. They probably don't last very long but for the price of an old bus ($500-$1,000) replacing it every 10+ years isn't that bad a deal.
That bone-chilling segment at 7:00 onwards where this maniac is approaching the enormous void in front of him. The droning voice of the EAS in the background, the muted driving footage, the low hum of that eerie synth. Even without the lightning, you can tell something is wrong from the way everything feels. Then you see that lightning light up the silhouette of something so vast that it shouldn't exist. The sky is swallowing the ground.
My dad was driving through on his rig, when this happened, and heard the sirens and decided to seek shelter at the liquor store and that saved his life. The rig was dragged about a mile away. It was the most traumatic thing he'd experienced. He then decided to stop doing all 48 states and went local after that. We're fortunate to have him here with us still after that.
This was absolutely phenomenal. I'm a weather enthusiast and I have a specific interest in tornadoes, especially historical ones. I've watch probably just about every tornado documentary on TH-cam, and yours is the best by far. You are grossly underrated my friend, I will be sharing this around and definitely referring folks to your channel. Keep up the wonderful work!
This one was quite nice I agree. Have you ever watched SirTumbl3? His aren’t quite documentaries I don’t believe but they’re quite entertaining regardless. (I’m not saying he is better than this guy whatsoever, just simply a recommendation”
Same here, I’m utterly scared of them, and I live in an area that’s kinda a mix-matched tornado alley, it’s scary as hell. I love documentaries of tornadoes. I use to love tornado watchers, sadly they died from a giant EF5 similar to greenburg.
Wow, just wow, okay where do I begin. As someone who has worked on like, 3 amateur natural disaster documentaries myself (Only one of which I am actually proud of), this has just blown me away. The use of custom made footage is something I could only dream of creating myself. The video is well paced and the such. I feel like the only issue that I had was that some of the terminology wasn't as well explained as I would like it to be, but then again since Meteorology is going to be my major in college, It doesn't bother me all to much. Everything from the audio mixing to the script itself just gave me goosebumps. You have definitely outdone yourself, especially with such a small subscriber count. I feel like there could have been so many small more bits of information put into the video, but at that point I'd be nick picking and honestly, I can't sing this video's praises so much. Since it was just one small documentary, the only thing that could have been added is interviews with people who survived the tornado and NWS officials, but of course that is asking for a LOT. In terms of small creator documentaries or just videos in general, this is one of the best I've ever seen. Rock on my dude, I'll definitely try and implement some ideas from this video into a video on Jarrell when I get to work on that at some point. Nearly 15 years later, This storm's impact on meteorology will be known to the community for many years to come. Rock on my dude, you earned yourself a subscriber and I can't wait to see what else you have planned.
@@The_Horizon unexpected place to find you. well i its not the first time you have popped up on some niche video that i never thought i would find anyone i know on. but why is it somehow always you no matter the topic.
It's crazy to learn that even after producing the monster that was the Greensburg EF5, this storm went to create THREE more tornadoes that likely were of EF5 strength as well. If that is true then the Greensburg supercell must have really been some sort of super storm.
iirc, one of the cells on 4/3 had 3 F5s and an F4. Hanover/Madison F4, and the Depauw & Sayler Park F5s. iirc Xenia was it's last tornado, but i can never get a clear answer on timing. Philadelphia/Cordova/Rainsville/Ringgold on 4/27 was also all the same cell. And then of course Pilger may have very well been an equal to Greensburg. Stanton had vehicle damage genuinely comparable to Moore/Bridge Creek, and one of the Pilger tornadoes debarked an entire grove of trees.
@@sukhastings4200 2011 outbreak had similar events with the cells that dropped Smithville tornado and Tuscaloosa and a few others I don’t remember exactly what events
They very likely were as strong or possibly even stronger. Tornado ratings are unfortunately based of the amount of destruction that is done to an area so a EF 4 or 5 tornado that is out in open farm land and does relatively little structure damage will likely only be rated an EF 3. You're not getting an accurate account of how violent the tornado actually was by going of the EF rating most of the time.
At 6:48…that shot where you see this monster….and then turned invisible again. That particular shot will always live rent free in my head. Beautiful, fascinating and terrifying.
The Greensburg tornado is such a fascinating and terrifying tornado. To have a tornado so huge hit a small town in the dead of night and basically wiping it off the map it’s like a horror movie. Not to mention to have a single cell create handful of epic monster tornadoes to follow in the coming hours is mind blowing. Just think of the coverage of this tornadic cell if it was during daylight? There were locations just to the northeast of Greensburg in Barton County that picked up 20+ inches of rain the coming days due to this system. It made Cheyenne Bottoms into a huge reservoir.
We were hit under the cover of darkness on March 28 1984 in North Carolina by a tragic barrage of tornadoes . Of 22 tornadoes mapped by Fujita seven were rated F4 . The largest enveloped entire towns such as McColl Maxton and Red Springs . The giant wedge tornado reached 2.5 miles wide . This storm actually maintained a two mile width for 20 miles . It is still recognized as the widest tornado on record for the east coast . The Moshannon State Forest tornado of May 31 1985 was 2.25 miles wide in the Allegheny mountains of Pennsylvania . The Hallam Nebraska tornado of 2004 reached 2.5 miles wide and destroyed 90 percent of the town .
Extra note that the Greensburg Tornado is not only the first officially rated EF5... it's also the widest, at 1.7 miles wide. The widest confirmed F5 before the integration of the Enhanced Fujita Scale was 1.8 miles wide... not far off.
This was VERY entertaining, professionally worded, and well put together. Would really love to see more videos just like this for Joplin, May 3 99, etc
The notion of driving blindly toward a massive EF-5 tornado on a pitch black highway, watching it get larger and larger with every lightning strike makes for some of the most nightmare-inducing footage attainable... and the 7:25 mark provides a near-perfect example of this. That is one terrifyingly riveting capture right there. This entire presentation was exceptionally well done. More severe weather and/or tornado channels could learn a lot from this video. Both extremely entertaining, as well as incredibly informative. Top-notch quality content, without a doubt. That being said, my sincere condolences to any and all of the people who were victimized by this monster. Thank you for sharing this with us, Gabe. I really hope to see more of these. Keep up the amazing work, my friend.
I vividly remember this. I was about 100 miles East and recall the lightning from that storm was some of the most intense I’ve ever seen in 50 years of experiencing Kansas weather. Greensburg was a pretty little town, with big shade trees and a little museum by the big hand dug well that housed an enormous Pallasite meteorite. It’s a neat town now and has been reborn, but it’s lost it’s quaint charm imo.
How this doesn't have more views I'll never know. Even though I was never affected by it, this tornado has always remained in the back of my mind ever since I first saw it on the show Storm Chasers when I was younger. It represents the truest worst-case scenario regarding tornadoes; a massive, extremely strong tornado shrouded by darkness headed straight for a town. This video only serves to cement that and I have to admit, having the tornado warning interrupt the video in the middle followed by dashcam footage of the tornado's silhouette shown only for seconds at a time by lightning, combined with the music, gave me goosebumps. That's the stuff nightmares are made of.
Incredible video! This has to be one of the scariest tornadoes in recent history. An EF-5 wedge tornado in the dead of night. Not something I’d want to mess with.
For real man. Based on the footage, it wasn't even visible unless there was lightning or a power flash. It was larger than the town itself. Even crazier, there were 3 other tornadoes that night that were pretty strong with 1 being even wider than the Greensburg tornado (1.7 miles wide). That particular tornado measuring 2.2 miles wide is just insane. I wouldn't want to mess with either of those 4 monsters.
I remember this day. The family was taking a trip to Wichita and we passed Greensburg early in the day and it was normal. On our way back we passed Greensburg again and it was like something out of a horror movie. The destruction was unreal, having to drive slowly past the town and seeing the damage was honestly terrifying
" Storm chasers" like Reed Timmer and Skip Talbot just to name a couple ( there are many more just as capable) are instrumental in providing warnings to give residents the precious minutes needed to get in a safe place and they have saved many , many lives. I want to thank all like them for putting themselves in danger to provide eyes on and in real time warnings that have saved so many and then they may be the first responders even capable of reaching hard hit areas. God bless them all. Thank you.
Excellent analysis and story telling. It's amazing how one storm can produce so many prolific tornadoes one right after another. A true testament to the conditions in place that night.
Thank you. Very professional. High Quality. I never feel joy from watching these storm videos but, I enjoy videos of this caliber (yours, Skip Talbot, Pecos Hank). (I will add more names as I can remember)
It’s not technically, ‘a miracle’ if you think about it. 11 people still lost their lives, that’s pretty tragic, I wouldn’t still call that a miracle even if it was only 11 people.
You plan on making any more videos? This one was great. Id also be interested in more of the science of how tornados are formed and how meteorologists use hodographs and other info to predict them.
@@baileyostrom2972 Yeah, I understand that. For me, it vibrates the inner ear in a way that I just do not like. It's *_cacophony,_* in the worst possible way.
This is one of the best tornado documentaries I’ve seen so far and I didn’t know much about this one in particular (but I did grow up watching some shows about the reconstruction of that little town) and the tornado emergency bit was particularly chilling. The footage showing that monster at night reminded me of the more recent tornado that destroyed parts of Kentucky, tornadoes at night are one of the things that scare me the most and I don’t live in an area where tornadoes happen often in general.
I started stoem chasing back in 2002. I remember that evening well and the next day as well. I also remember chasing the storms in southwest Nebraska on March 28. I missed the big tornado in Grant, Nebraska by a few miles. Thanks for posting this documentary.
Fantastic documentary! Your editing style adds to the depth of the presentation of this event tenfold. I would love to see a documentary on the Joplin tornado if you continue to do these documentaries!
Nighttime tornadoes are terrifying. To think a mile wide monster like that is completely invisible is completely insane. Being able to just with a lightning flash is both terrifying and fascinating at the same time.
This is top notch work here, Gabe. Your writing was crisp and very informative while your delivery was comfortable to listen to and easy to follow. The editing was tight and followed the storyline, good use of nat sound. If you're not doing this professionally, you should be, IMHO.
You really should consider uploading more content similar to this. Myself and many others loved this video, would love to see more content from you man
That clip of the lightning showing quick flashes of the monstrous tornado in pitch black atmosphere is a real life nightmare. I couldn't imagine driving in that storm or especially looking out the window to see that possibly coming towards me.
The absolute worse situation you could possibly be in. An EF5 tornado that is damn near 2 miles wide coming at you in complete darkness. It does not get much worse.
Man, this was a great video! I went to binge-watch anything else you've made and I'm bummed there aint more. Cant wait to see what ya do in the future!
This IMO is the scariest tornado of all time. The tornado was wider than Greensburg. It was at night. It was insanely powerful. The only glimpses we got of the monster were in brief flashes of lightning. Truly bone chilling
I think the El Reno Tornado is the scariest. It was even bigger and totally covered in rain and I can’t find a video with a clear of view of what it actually looked like its full size because it is surrounded by rain. The scariest part of it is the descriptions of the what people saw inside the rain curtain. Just a bunch of massive suction vortices raging around.
This tornado has always interested me the most. Probably because I was living in Wichita when it happened and we ran a canned food drive for the kids of Greensburg. This tornado came in the dead middle of the night, 1.8 miles wide. It swallowed the entire town. How fucking terrifying.
I visited Greensburg on a road trip around 1996 or so, saw the Big Well... Anyway, came back thru town with my wife in 2013... The difference from what I remember was core-shaking. That Mother Nature could erase the human footprint like that was unnerving and pure in its example before me.
Greensburg tornado would always be the scariest one ever for me. The night time rural setup is a true nightmare scenario. All you get is only brief glimpses at the monster through a well placed lightning flash. The horror of it approaching must have been unbearable.
Bravo! That was an incredible documentary. I'm thoroughly impressed with your editing skills. I genuinely felt uneasy during the sequence where the car was approaching the lightning illuminated tornado. You earned my subscription, keep up the good work with whatever you end up doing.
I was 9 years old at the time living in Goessel, Ks at the time living with intense paranoia. Everytime I heard that warning sound I would panic and cry like the it was the end of the world. I was up late with my father watching the weather to make sure we'd be safe that night. The description of the storm coupled with what I saw on radar scared me to my very core, I was hysterical to the point my father had to call my mother who up in Lawrence at the time to calm me down. I never physically saw that tornado and I can't imagine what was going through the heads of those that did but I'll never forget that feeling and I will never ever take mother nature lightly again because of it.
I really appreciate the tone of this video. Tornadoes aren’t to be glorified even if the processes around them maybe be interesting. Tornadoes are deadly and something to be feared and this video definitely leaves you feeling at least a tiny bit uneasy, especially after the abrupt cut into the warning
The tornado family produced by that supercell was nothing short of insane. Reminds me a lot of the Super Outbreak when the one cell dropped the Tuscaloosa tornado, went north of Birmingham, and then dropped another monster near Ringgold, GA.
The way you stitched together the night time footage with the tornado warning was incredible and very eerie - I can't fathom what people experienced this night... holy.....
This is a top notch video. If you stay the course, this channel may very well become one of the best weather channels on TH-cam. Definitely subscribing.
I see a bright future for your channel, everything about this video is phenomenal. I have to say the cut to the emergency broadcast is genuinely horrifying. PLEAE continue that
Thanks so much for this. It’s really interesting learning more about the meteorology behind this memorable tornado. I can’t believe it’s been 15 years.
I watched this tornado live on a stream back in the day! God it was terrifying.... It was an extremely tense chase being at night and only visible with the lightening! I'll never forget watching the terror unfold live.
Just watched this for a second time and it was still entertaining. Great video and I think I speak for everyone else that has seen that when I say I look forward to more!
The moment you cut yourself off with the "Tornado Warning" emergency screen and the subsequent display of flashes of that monster tornado truly freaked me the hell out. Brilliant, man.
Scared the absolute MESS out of me lol.
DUDE! It is storming outside I completely forgot I was watching a TH-cam video it literally got me!
I was watching this with my dad and we both were scared to death lol
spoiler alert
And the music was just the cherry on top, tornadoes at night are one of the things that scare me the most and I don’t live in an area where tornadoes happen often to begin with.
Jeez. Those lightning flashes revealing the absolute size of that gigantic tornado gives me chills. Literally the definition of wedge.
Just like a strobe light . I witnessed such on March 28 1984 during our Carolinas Outbreak .
Actually, from what storm spotters stated from when The Weather Channel covered this tornado. It could've been larger than what people saw. The narrator said something of the lines of. "The tornado was so large not even lightning could evoke it's true size."
A 1.8 mile potentially even 2-mile-wide tornado is just ridiculous.
He really dropped one of the best and most realistic tornado videos of all time and never came back
As a truck driver, I have driven through Greensburg many times. I saw the damage firsthand and saw the recovery on subsequent trips. As you stated, the town has been completely rebuilt which is a living testament to their strength and resolve.
Greensburg was among the most violent tornado damage paths . It reminded me of Xenia Ohio and Parkersburg .
@@jeffbryan4019 it reminded me of Xenia too, since I grew up in Beavercreek, Ohio which borders Xenia. I remember the tornado flew over Beavercreek and touched down in Xenia. I remember it well being that I was 10 years old at the time. My mom drove us through Xenia about 3 weeks after the tornado. The place looked like a war zone.
@@SoCal780how many states have you been in
@@Fordtraktor1 46. I have not been to Maine and Rhode Island.
@@SoCal780cool I’m from smithville Mississippi and I remember the horrible day of April 27th 2011. Ps, have you been to smithville?
You have hit on the biggest weakness of the Fujita Scale. Unless a tornado passes through a populated area, there is much less damage left behind upon which to determine the intensity. The El Reno, Oklahoma tornado is a perfect example. While the winds in this monster were directly measured by a mobile Doppler radar at over 300 mph, the tornado was only rated as an EF3 because it mainly affected a sparsely populated area. I have absolutely no doubt that the El Reno tornado was an EF5, but the NWS has to be consistent or else the records of past tornado strengths will mean nothing. I have a firm belief that one day, the wind speeds of every tornado will be measured directly and will result in much more accurate records. The ratings of tornadoes using the F and EF scales will be called into question, and the two rating systems will be non comparable.
It literally seems anti-scientific to not look at actual strength objectively. Do officials say a magnitude 7.0 earthquake isn't one just because it didn't damage any buildings? It's time to retire this whole F/EF-scale BS. It served its purpose, and mad respect to Dr. Fujita, but let's progress.
Honestly I'm with you on a lot there but really a damage-based scale is the best we've got right now for accurately and consistently determining tornado strength. Its not like we can just wheel out a radar truck to scan every tornado that ever happens. How else could we rate these tornadoes if not by looking at what they did? Maybe its not the most accurate scale but it's literally all we have right now. IIRC Tim Marshall and a large group of engineers/grad students/etc are working on a new version of the EF scale that looks to be a complete overhaul of the current scale, going way way deeper than the current EF scale already does.
@@gabepena2868 after thinking about I understand why it’s rated by damage, but scientifically rating them by wind speed and intensity would probably help, for example, let’s say a super powerful wedge hits farmland and gets an ef1. Two meteorologists talk about it.
X: yo dude did you hear about ef1 earlier while you were on vacation
Y: nah bro, it’s just an ef1
X: nononoono it was a wedge, mann super important
Y: Show me brooo
Like, rating it by intensity would most likely help with research, I’m really bad at explaining things, so I hope you understand
Edit: it would help with studying patterns when looking at official meteorology records
The funny thing is that initially they pre rated the El reno event as an ef5 but looked at the damage and decided tondowngrade
Marshall is working on enhancing the scale to consider more damage Gabe is right. Hopefully the team working on the upgrades will be done sooner rather than later to start getting more “accurate” ratings. Here’s a news story on it: th-cam.com/video/wXrCLWVhKLE/w-d-xo.html
Top-tier storytelling and editing! You have earned yourself a new subscriber and deserve plenty more.
I subscribed too 😃👍
ik you from somewhere lmao
@@BlakeNunnelly 🤔
can we also talk about the absolute peak choice of sound design. like dude, this is art. i cannot understate how amazing the soud choices are
About a week after the storm my high school's 4H club shipped several busses of students over to help with the cleanup. we spent most of the day just wandering a field north of town pulling out whole sheets of metal roofing material and 2x4s that had buried themselves, and winding up what felt like miles of barbed wire. The thing that never gets talked about after the big ones is how windy it gets in town afterwards, when there's no trees or buildings to act as windbreaks.
Naw
@@kansas3332
Lol what
Friends and family commented similarly after 1974 Xenia, Ohio, tornado. Our friends had a silver maple survive. City came through to trim off damage parts. Tree lived another 25-30 years until removed by another homeowner. A drive down USR 35 bypass show clearly the path the tornado look: trees, nothing, then trees again. My chiropractor related a similar story when he was driven by a family friend who was a state trooper at the time.
I visited Greensburg in mid-February for the first time. I’ve known about this tornado since it happened but to see the town itself with my own eyes was surreal. I ended up running into a local politician who gave us a tour of some of the public government buildings in the town and took us to a great diner. It was purely amazing hearing the stories of the people there, how tight-knit they are, and how involved everyone is in the community. Truly one of the most amazing towns I have ever visited.
I passed through Greensburg in mid March of 2021 and even at night the entire town looked like they had just built it within the past year
One thing you don't mention is that the 15 minutes of immediate emergency warning was spent by neighbors with basements gathering in their basementless neighbors and many other such actions that cut the death toll a third.
people have hearts
I don’t understand
@@Filmedbyiilyzabith Neighbors were giving shelter to other neighbors who didn't have a place to hide.
@@poetcomic1 ohhhh
@@poetcomic1 In the plains states not all houses have basements, esp. older houses before 1970. It just was not necessary. Why they did that, IDK. If you have a slab foundation house you're pretty well fucked in a tornado unless you're rich enough to have a bunker. I've seen poorer people dig ramps in their yard and then back a school bus into the pit and re-enforce the insides and put dirt over the whole bus in a mound to make a tornado shelter. They probably don't last very long but for the price of an old bus ($500-$1,000) replacing it every 10+ years isn't that bad a deal.
That bone-chilling segment at 7:00 onwards where this maniac is approaching the enormous void in front of him. The droning voice of the EAS in the background, the muted driving footage, the low hum of that eerie synth. Even without the lightning, you can tell something is wrong from the way everything feels. Then you see that lightning light up the silhouette of something so vast that it shouldn't exist. The sky is swallowing the ground.
My dad was driving through on his rig, when this happened, and heard the sirens and decided to seek shelter at the liquor store and that saved his life. The rig was dragged about a mile away. It was the most traumatic thing he'd experienced. He then decided to stop doing all 48 states and went local after that. We're fortunate to have him here with us still after that.
This was absolutely phenomenal. I'm a weather enthusiast and I have a specific interest in tornadoes, especially historical ones. I've watch probably just about every tornado documentary on TH-cam, and yours is the best by far. You are grossly underrated my friend, I will be sharing this around and definitely referring folks to your channel. Keep up the wonderful work!
This one was quite nice I agree. Have you ever watched SirTumbl3? His aren’t quite documentaries I don’t believe but they’re quite entertaining regardless. (I’m not saying he is better than this guy whatsoever, just simply a recommendation”
@@someoneelse2489 Oh I haven't! I'll be sure to check him out, thank you for the recommendation. :)
Same here, I’m utterly scared of them, and I live in an area that’s kinda a mix-matched tornado alley, it’s scary as hell. I love documentaries of tornadoes. I use to love tornado watchers, sadly they died from a giant EF5 similar to greenburg.
Wow, just wow, okay where do I begin.
As someone who has worked on like, 3 amateur natural disaster documentaries myself (Only one of which I am actually proud of), this has just blown me away. The use of custom made footage is something I could only dream of creating myself. The video is well paced and the such. I feel like the only issue that I had was that some of the terminology wasn't as well explained as I would like it to be, but then again since Meteorology is going to be my major in college, It doesn't bother me all to much. Everything from the audio mixing to the script itself just gave me goosebumps. You have definitely outdone yourself, especially with such a small subscriber count. I feel like there could have been so many small more bits of information put into the video, but at that point I'd be nick picking and honestly, I can't sing this video's praises so much. Since it was just one small documentary, the only thing that could have been added is interviews with people who survived the tornado and NWS officials, but of course that is asking for a LOT. In terms of small creator documentaries or just videos in general, this is one of the best I've ever seen. Rock on my dude, I'll definitely try and implement some ideas from this video into a video on Jarrell when I get to work on that at some point. Nearly 15 years later, This storm's impact on meteorology will be known to the community for many years to come.
Rock on my dude, you earned yourself a subscriber and I can't wait to see what else you have planned.
thank you mr gd guy
@@The_Horizon you confuse me sometimes
@@Alferia he means geometry dash
@@The_Horizon unexpected place to find you. well i its not the first time you have popped up on some niche video that i never thought i would find anyone i know on. but why is it somehow always you no matter the topic.
@@The_Horizon never would’ve had Mr. Anti-PayToWin to be a weather geek like the rest of us but I’m certainly not complaining
Amazing editing, loved the little details such as the highlight on the CAPE profile and the glitchy cuts to the tornado.
Exactly! 3,500 J/kg is mental!
It's crazy to learn that even after producing the monster that was the Greensburg EF5, this storm went to create THREE more tornadoes that likely were of EF5 strength as well. If that is true then the Greensburg supercell must have really been some sort of super storm.
Re cyfing. In the 4/3/74 the same cell that hit Brandenburg, KY as an F5 hit Louisville 45 minutes later as an F4
iirc, one of the cells on 4/3 had 3 F5s and an F4. Hanover/Madison F4, and the Depauw & Sayler Park F5s. iirc Xenia was it's last tornado, but i can never get a clear answer on timing.
Philadelphia/Cordova/Rainsville/Ringgold on 4/27 was also all the same cell.
And then of course Pilger may have very well been an equal to Greensburg. Stanton had vehicle damage genuinely comparable to Moore/Bridge Creek, and one of the Pilger tornadoes debarked an entire grove of trees.
@@sukhastings4200 2011 outbreak had similar events with the cells that dropped Smithville tornado and Tuscaloosa and a few others I don’t remember exactly what events
The Trousdale tornado was 2.2 miles wide, this storm was just a monster at producing
They very likely were as strong or possibly even stronger. Tornado ratings are unfortunately based of the amount of destruction that is done to an area so a EF 4 or 5 tornado that is out in open farm land and does relatively little structure damage will likely only be rated an EF 3. You're not getting an accurate account of how violent the tornado actually was by going of the EF rating most of the time.
At 6:48…that shot where you see this monster….and then turned invisible again. That particular shot will always live rent free in my head. Beautiful, fascinating and terrifying.
You gotta do more of these on days like Joplin, Tuscaloosa and the recent Andover tornado great Vid and hope for many more! ❤️
This is why greensburg is my fave tornado
It’s the perfect definition on how a tornado is portrayed and preformed
The Greensburg tornado is such a fascinating and terrifying tornado. To have a tornado so huge hit a small town in the dead of night and basically wiping it off the map it’s like a horror movie.
Not to mention to have a single cell create handful of epic monster tornadoes to follow in the coming hours is mind blowing. Just think of the coverage of this tornadic cell if it was during daylight?
There were locations just to the northeast of Greensburg in Barton County that picked up 20+ inches of rain the coming days due to this system. It made Cheyenne Bottoms into a huge reservoir.
The width of the tornado covered virtually the entire town. Its amazing there wasn't a higher loss of life
We were hit under the cover of darkness on March 28 1984 in North Carolina by a tragic barrage of tornadoes . Of 22 tornadoes mapped by Fujita seven were rated F4 . The largest enveloped entire towns such as McColl Maxton and Red Springs . The giant wedge tornado reached 2.5 miles wide . This storm actually maintained a two mile width for 20 miles . It is still recognized as the widest tornado on record for the east coast .
The Moshannon State Forest tornado of May 31 1985 was 2.25 miles wide in the Allegheny mountains of Pennsylvania . The Hallam Nebraska tornado of 2004 reached 2.5 miles wide and destroyed 90 percent of the town .
Extra note that the Greensburg Tornado is not only the first officially rated EF5... it's also the widest, at 1.7 miles wide. The widest confirmed F5 before the integration of the Enhanced Fujita Scale was 1.8 miles wide... not far off.
Absolutely incredible. Loved the informative storytelling and detailed analysis. Can't wait for more
This was VERY entertaining, professionally worded, and well put together. Would really love to see more videos just like this for Joplin, May 3 99, etc
The notion of driving blindly toward a massive EF-5 tornado on a pitch black highway, watching it get larger and larger with every lightning strike makes for some of the most nightmare-inducing footage attainable... and the 7:25 mark provides a near-perfect example of this. That is one terrifyingly riveting capture right there. This entire presentation was exceptionally well done. More severe weather and/or tornado channels could learn a lot from this video. Both extremely entertaining, as well as incredibly informative. Top-notch quality content, without a doubt. That being said, my sincere condolences to any and all of the people who were victimized by this monster. Thank you for sharing this with us, Gabe. I really hope to see more of these. Keep up the amazing work, my friend.
Dude made an insane video and just left.
I vividly remember this. I was about 100 miles East and recall the lightning from that storm was some of the most intense I’ve ever seen in 50 years of experiencing Kansas weather.
Greensburg was a pretty little town, with big shade trees and a little museum by the big hand dug well that housed an enormous Pallasite meteorite.
It’s a neat town now and has been reborn, but it’s lost it’s quaint charm imo.
How this doesn't have more views I'll never know. Even though I was never affected by it, this tornado has always remained in the back of my mind ever since I first saw it on the show Storm Chasers when I was younger. It represents the truest worst-case scenario regarding tornadoes; a massive, extremely strong tornado shrouded by darkness headed straight for a town. This video only serves to cement that and I have to admit, having the tornado warning interrupt the video in the middle followed by dashcam footage of the tornado's silhouette shown only for seconds at a time by lightning, combined with the music, gave me goosebumps. That's the stuff nightmares are made of.
Incredible video! This has to be one of the scariest tornadoes in recent history. An EF-5 wedge tornado in the dead of night. Not something I’d want to mess with.
For real man. Based on the footage, it wasn't even visible unless there was lightning or a power flash. It was larger than the town itself. Even crazier, there were 3 other tornadoes that night that were pretty strong with 1 being even wider than the Greensburg tornado (1.7 miles wide). That particular tornado measuring 2.2 miles wide is just insane. I wouldn't want to mess with either of those 4 monsters.
I remember this day. The family was taking a trip to Wichita and we passed Greensburg early in the day and it was normal. On our way back we passed Greensburg again and it was like something out of a horror movie. The destruction was unreal, having to drive slowly past the town and seeing the damage was honestly terrifying
" Storm chasers" like Reed Timmer and Skip Talbot just to name a couple ( there are many more just as capable) are instrumental in providing warnings to give residents the precious minutes needed to get in a safe place and they have saved many , many lives. I want to thank all like them for putting themselves in danger to provide eyes on and in real time warnings that have saved so many and then they may be the first responders even capable of reaching hard hit areas.
God bless them all.
Thank you.
Bro dropped one of the best tornado videos of all time and then dipped
Excellent analysis and story telling. It's amazing how one storm can produce so many prolific tornadoes one right after another. A true testament to the conditions in place that night.
Thank you. Very professional. High Quality.
I never feel joy from watching these storm videos but, I enjoy videos of this caliber (yours, Skip Talbot, Pecos Hank).
(I will add more names as I can remember)
I also reccomend Tornado Forensics. They do synced videos of big tornado and in-depth damage path analysis
The fact that only 11 people died when a town took a direct hit from an ef5 leveling the entire thing to the ground is a miracle.
It’s not technically, ‘a miracle’ if you think about it. 11 people still lost their lives, that’s pretty tragic, I wouldn’t still call that a miracle even if it was only 11 people.
Gotta say the cut to the emergency signal was very well done. gave me chills
Such an underrated video! This is one, if not, the best tornado documentary I’ve ever seen!
We need more meteorological breakdowns like this, this is an incredible video
Great stuff, Gabe! Subbed for sure. Love the way you weaved a ton of info into the larger narrative without getting bogged down.
You plan on making any more videos? This one was great. Id also be interested in more of the science of how tornados are formed and how meteorologists use hodographs and other info to predict them.
incredible vid. I keep coming back to this one. So well done.
The sudden cutoff to the EAS warning caught me off guard completely. Wasn't expecting what most call a #jumpscare in a vid like this one.
Every time the radio goes out, I always get VERY nervous because I’m thinking the EAS is coming on. It always scares the crap out of me!
@@baileyostrom2972 Yeah, I understand that. For me, it vibrates the inner ear in a way that I just do not like. It's *_cacophony,_* in the worst possible way.
This video deserves much more likes for the amount of views and the quality of this editing. Well done!
Excellent video. Especially for a first full video. Great job, man
This is one of the best tornado documentaries I’ve seen so far and I didn’t know much about this one in particular (but I did grow up watching some shows about the reconstruction of that little town) and the tornado emergency bit was particularly chilling.
The footage showing that monster at night reminded me of the more recent tornado that destroyed parts of Kentucky, tornadoes at night are one of the things that scare me the most and I don’t live in an area where tornadoes happen often in general.
I started stoem chasing back in 2002. I remember that evening well and the next day as well. I also remember chasing the storms in southwest Nebraska on March 28. I missed the big tornado in Grant, Nebraska by a few miles. Thanks for posting this documentary.
I keep coming back to this video. It's just so well done.
Fantastic documentary! Your editing style adds to the depth of the presentation of this event tenfold. I would love to see a documentary on the Joplin tornado if you continue to do these documentaries!
Nighttime tornadoes are terrifying. To think a mile wide monster like that is completely invisible is completely insane. Being able to just with a lightning flash is both terrifying and fascinating at the same time.
This is top notch work here, Gabe. Your writing was crisp and very informative while your delivery was comfortable to listen to and easy to follow. The editing was tight and followed the storyline, good use of nat sound. If you're not doing this professionally, you should be, IMHO.
You really should consider uploading more content similar to this. Myself and many others loved this video, would love to see more content from you man
Bro made one masterpiece then dipped, respect
Wow, incredible breakdown and review of this. I'm really looking forward to more!
i come back to this and watch this all the time. amazing work.
That clip of the lightning showing quick flashes of the monstrous tornado in pitch black atmosphere is a real life nightmare. I couldn't imagine driving in that storm or especially looking out the window to see that possibly coming towards me.
This is unbelievably thorough yet pithy info making it completely watchable for laymen like myself. Thanks!
Genuinely the best tornado documentary I’ve ever seen.
Dude this is so well done. If you can, please do the Mayfield EF4 tornado.
That was heartbreaking
that will likely be my next vid, I haven't started work on it yet so it'll be a while but i plan on making it over the summer
@@gabepena2868 Work at your best pace. The only way you get the best results is with time. Either way, an amazing documentary you made here.
@@gabepena2868 I think you should do both of the EF4s on that day since they go hand in hand
The absolute worse situation you could possibly be in. An EF5 tornado that is damn near 2 miles wide coming at you in complete darkness. It does not get much worse.
Dude, this is so bad ass. You deserve so much more attention
This is very well done. As a meteorologist who formerly worked in the plains (Tulsa) I really appreciated the synoptic overview. Good job.
This is amazingly edited! The music and jump cuts make it so ominous. Accurately capturing that night.
Holy crap. This was beautiful. Very informative and well edited out. You got a new sub here!
Well edited,narrated. I like the low key,matter of fact delivery. The video is concise,not hyperbole,informative. Well done!
PS: I am a new subscriber, looking forward to your next project!
Dude the production of this video was absolutely top-notch!
I would love to see more videos like this one for other well-known tornadoes.
Man, this was a great video! I went to binge-watch anything else you've made and I'm bummed there aint more. Cant wait to see what ya do in the future!
This editing style is absolute fire. I love how sophisticated and easy to follow it is. Hope you keep making videos!
Glad the algorithm provided this gem of a video.
Great work on the edit, production and research. This thing was a monster.
This was incredibly cool! Super awesome to have more high quality videos about the power of the atmosphere.
This IMO is the scariest tornado of all time. The tornado was wider than Greensburg. It was at night. It was insanely powerful. The only glimpses we got of the monster were in brief flashes of lightning. Truly bone chilling
I think the El Reno Tornado is the scariest. It was even bigger and totally covered in rain and I can’t find a video with a clear of view of what it actually looked like its full size because it is surrounded by rain. The scariest part of it is the descriptions of the what people saw inside the rain curtain. Just a bunch of massive suction vortices raging around.
This tornado has always interested me the most. Probably because I was living in Wichita when it happened and we ran a canned food drive for the kids of Greensburg.
This tornado came in the dead middle of the night, 1.8 miles wide. It swallowed the entire town. How fucking terrifying.
Well this might be your only work on here . But its really good . You have the voice for this.
the sound design in this movie is impeccable! kudos!
Such a horrific tornado! My parents were around that area after the EF-4 in Enterprise AL, It was sad to see. Thanks for the video
I visited Greensburg on a road trip around 1996 or so, saw the Big Well... Anyway, came back thru town with my wife in 2013... The difference from what I remember was core-shaking. That Mother Nature could erase the human footprint like that was unnerving and pure in its example before me.
Greensburg tornado would always be the scariest one ever for me. The night time rural setup is a true nightmare scenario. All you get is only brief glimpses at the monster through a well placed lightning flash. The horror of it approaching must have been unbearable.
Bravo! That was an incredible documentary. I'm thoroughly impressed with your editing skills. I genuinely felt uneasy during the sequence where the car was approaching the lightning illuminated tornado. You earned my subscription, keep up the good work with whatever you end up doing.
This is brilliantly done.
I was 9 years old at the time living in Goessel, Ks at the time living with intense paranoia. Everytime I heard that warning sound I would panic and cry like the it was the end of the world. I was up late with my father watching the weather to make sure we'd be safe that night. The description of the storm coupled with what I saw on radar scared me to my very core, I was hysterical to the point my father had to call my mother who up in Lawrence at the time to calm me down. I never physically saw that tornado and I can't imagine what was going through the heads of those that did but I'll never forget that feeling and I will never ever take mother nature lightly again because of it.
that was one hell of a good video. Simple, clear, and instructive. I'm hyped to see your next works!!
How in gods name are you not more popular?? This is top tier quality content :D
Thank you for this. WELL DONE. Excellently done. Would love to see you do the same on the 2021 Mayfield, Ky Tornado.
Videos like this are why youtube is so much better than any show on television. I've subscribed.
I really appreciate the tone of this video. Tornadoes aren’t to be glorified even if the processes around them maybe be interesting. Tornadoes are deadly and something to be feared and this video definitely leaves you feeling at least a tiny bit uneasy, especially after the abrupt cut into the warning
You should do an episode on the 1947 Glaizer-Higgins-Woodward F5 it's actually really interesting
Excellent video, great editing. Subscribed to your channel! Looking forward to your future videos
That warning sequence is spine chilling
The tornado family produced by that supercell was nothing short of insane. Reminds me a lot of the Super Outbreak when the one cell dropped the Tuscaloosa tornado, went north of Birmingham, and then dropped another monster near Ringgold, GA.
The way you stitched together the night time footage with the tornado warning was incredible and very eerie - I can't fathom what people experienced this night... holy.....
Fantastic Job man. The storytelling in this is wonderful.
This was amazing! I instantly sub’ed to you and was sad it’s your only video! Super well done and thank you 💙
This is a top notch video. If you stay the course, this channel may very well become one of the best weather channels on TH-cam. Definitely subscribing.
I see a bright future for your channel, everything about this video is phenomenal. I have to say the cut to the emergency broadcast is genuinely horrifying. PLEAE continue that
Thanks so much for this. It’s really interesting learning more about the meteorology behind this memorable tornado. I can’t believe it’s been 15 years.
Well done! I subscribed and look forward to viewing more of your uploads as you seem to put out quality work.
I hope you will do more tornado storytelling like this! It’s very neat.
I wish u would make similar videos for all the big ones. Joplin, Bridge Creek, Moore, Jarrell and on and on. Super interesting video!
That tornado is genuinely terrifying. I thought the Mayfield Tornado was terrifying but this is something else.
Wonderful video, extremely well put together and the narration was top notch!
I watched this tornado live on a stream back in the day!
God it was terrifying....
It was an extremely tense chase being at night and only visible with the lightening!
I'll never forget watching the terror unfold live.
Absolutely amazing work, please make more of these!!
Just watched this for a second time and it was still entertaining. Great video and I think I speak for everyone else that has seen that when I say I look forward to more!