I just saw on the news there was a EF1 tornado in Montebello, CA.

I know y'all aren't used to tornados, so I wanted to check on you. Even baby tornadoes like this can be scary if you have never seen one.




Seriously, is everyone OK?

That area is mostly industrial and while not trivial....an industrial area. The person hurt was not serious. It has been a helluva year here...in So Cal and also in parts of AZ depending on the area there as well.

While all the water is welcomed....there is more rain on the way next week. Last night it rained pretty hard.

Pushing 35 inches of rain on my gauge here in Glendora CA and in AZ....well over 7 ft. of snow over the Winter.

Mammoth mountain will set an all time record since records are kept while Tahoe is over 56 feet...not since the Donner party.

Spring melt hasn't even started yet. So...good news in that regard.

Bad News:

We had a trip to Yosemite planned late this Summer....they are now closed indefinately on the valley floor. Potential flooding.

That’s close to Oscar’s neck of the woods.

If you can see one your OK because it ain't too close. If you're in one you can't see it. I've been in 2 of them and by the time I realized either was a tornado it was a 1/2 block down the street.

We had several in one day in Sunnyvale about ... I think 25 years ago? It was really weird looking out the window from work and seeing the sky like that. "Gee, if I were back in IL, I would head for the basement--but we're in CA and we don't get tornadoes."

Found out on the news that night that there were, in fact, tornadoes.

--DD

My friend Dorian that runs his specialty sports/race car service in Montebello says that it left about a ½ mile of debris in the area. His shop was 1 block down the street from where it touched down; lots of roofs damaged and flying debris. His shop guys just shaken nerves, concrete tilt-up building held up well.

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We got a tornado warning alert here for Calabasas/Agoura Hills. I literally jumped out of my chair when our alarm system panel started freaking out for the first time ever due to that. No actual tornado was observed locally but the wind was vicious for a bit.

we get them here. but not USA scale.
i knew i had a set of photos on file.
found them.
back in 2015. up at one of my jobs.
it was attempting to form.
didn't go full funnel and hit the ground.
but it was spinning up.
went very dark mid morning.
went outside as i wondered what was going on.
fortunately it was tracking laterally and not coming at the house.
up in northern victorian in an area of australia very similar to the midwest.

a couple of years before the late construction stages of the project a funnel hit the ground only a couple of miles from here and did a lot of damage.
i joked with my client that he lives in tornado alley.

the strongest ones here are recorded at F3.
don't get close to the size of monster storms of mid west USA.
still can kill you if it happens to go right over you.
its virtually impossible to engineer anything to resist the wind forces of these things.
even the less powerful ones.




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