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Heavy storms and tornados tore through the US Midwest over several days
beginning 18th May and continuing into the 21st. We take the worst hit
area as representative.
From the New York Times:
MOORE, Okla. — A giant tornado, a mile wide or more, killed at least 91
people, 20 of them children, as it tore across parts of Oklahoma City
and its suburbs Monday afternoon, flattening homes, flinging cars
through the air and crushing at least two schools.
(I believe the number of deaths has been revised downward.)
The injured flooded into hospitals, and the authorities said many people
remained trapped, even as rescue workers struggled to make their way
through debris-clogged streets to the devastated suburb of Moore, where
much of the damage occurred.
Amy Elliott, the spokeswoman for the Oklahoma City medical examiner,
said at least 91 people had died, including the children, and officials
said that toll was likely to climb. Hospitals reported at least 145
people injured, 70 of them children.
Plaza Towers Elementary School in Moore was reduced to a pile of twisted
metal and toppled walls. Rescue workers were able to pull several
children from the rubble, but on Monday evening crews were still
struggling to cut through fallen beams and clear debris amid reports
that dozens of students were trapped. At Briarwood Elementary School in
Oklahoma City, on the border with Moore, cars were thrown through the
facade and the roof was torn off.
The tornado touched down at 2:56 p.m., 16 minutes after the first
warning went out, and traveled for 20 miles, said Keli Pirtle, a
spokeswoman for the National Weather Service in Norman, Okla. It was on
the ground for 40 minutes, she said. It struck the town of Newcastle and
traveled about 10 miles to Moore, a populous suburb of Oklahoma City.
Ms. Pirtle said preliminary data suggested that it was a Category 4
tornado on the Enhanced Fujita scale, which measures tornado strength on
a scale of 0 to 5. A definitive assessment will not be available until
Tuesday, she said.
The GCP event
was proposed by Hans Wendt, and set for 24 hours on the 20th UTC.
The result is Chisquare 86944.264 on 86400 for p = 0.095 and Z = 1.308.
It is important to keep in mind that we have only a tiny
statistical effect, so that it is always hard to distinguish
signal from noise. This means that every "success" might be
largely driven by chance, and every "null" might include a real
signal overwhelmed by noise. In the long run, a real effect can
be identified only by patiently accumulating replications of
similar analyses.
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