The EF-5 Tornado of Moore Oklahoma in 2013

On May 20th, 2013 an EF-5 tornado ran through a swath of Moore Oklahoma. This was a disastrous and devastating tornado for the small town. It took away the lives of 24 people and out of those people were seven children. The tornado was on the highest category of the Fujita scale, which measures wind speeds, with winds that ranged from 200 mph and up. It wiped out schools, medical centers and homes leaving little hope for the residents of that town. Moore Oklahoma sits in what we call “tornado alley”. What happens is warm moist air from the gulf, warm dry air from the southwest, and cold air from the Rocky Mountains and Canada all come together creating perfect conditions for a thunderstorm. If the thunderstorm rotates in a circular motion it can create a mesocyclone. A mesocyclone doesn't always lead to a tornado but in Moore Oklahoma’s case it did. There was over 2 billion dollar’s worth of damage from the storm. F.E.M.A, Red Cross, and other major outlets came to help and support the residents. This tornado did cause people to think of better ways of protection to help reduce the number of deaths if a tornado was to ever hit again.