Rare and Unusual Tornadoes Captivate Meteorologists

 

Rare and Unusual Tornadoes Captivate Meteorologists

A powerful storm system swept across southern Oklahoma on Tuesday night, producing multiple tornadoes, including a rare anticyclonic tornado that left meteorologists in awe. The unusual weather event was marked by two tornadoes exhibiting odd behavior, with one powerful tornado looping backward and recrossing its previous path, and another significant tornado spinning in the "wrong" direction.

The rare anticyclonic tornado, which spun clockwise, is estimated to occur in only about 1% of tornadoes. This tornado was particularly unusual as it formed on the southern edge of the same storm that produced the looping tornado, and was briefly active at the same time.

Radar imagery showed the tornadoes emerging from the same powerful thunderstorm, with the anticyclonic tornado producing tell-tale damage signatures that indicated it lifted debris thousands of feet into the air, a sign of a strong tornado. Most anticyclonic tornadoes are weak and short-lived, making this twister rare on two fronts.

The storms were part of a powerful supercell thunderstorm that roared to life near the Oklahoma-Texas border and tracked east. The storm produced a "large and extremely dangerous" tornado north of Loveland, Oklahoma, just before 10 p.m. CDT, according to a weather service warning.

Radar imagery showed the tornado tracking east before slowing down considerably, taking a turn to the north, then to the west, and looping over where it had just hit. This type of behavior is not common, with only a few examples of looping tornadoes in history, including an EF5 tornado that devastated the town of Greensburg, Kansas, in May 2007.

Meteorologists were impressed by the rare and unusual weather event, with Rick Smith, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Norman, Oklahoma, stating, "You certainly don't see this every day."

Luckily, the erratic twisters unfolded over a sparsely populated area, and there are no reports of injuries, deaths, or significant structural damage. However, additional severe thunderstorms are possible from Texas to Nebraska on Wednesday, with some of these storms potentially producing tornadoes, including in the same areas of southwestern Oklahoma hit by Tuesday night's storms.