Tornadoes

Local History:

November 16, 1989, an F-2 tornado struck near Charles Town and moved northeast to Hagerstown. The damage path was 4 miles long in the county and about 100 yards wide. There were 0 deaths, 3 injuries, 5 people evacuated. The tornado destroyed a mobile home, a garage, trees and damaged some farm buildings.

Other wind-damaging storms:

April 28, 2002- Farm at Rippon was hit by damaging winds. Destroyed a barn.

July 21, 1998-A Wind storm caused power outages in Millville, Shepherdstown, Bolivar when the sub station at Millville was damaged.

Personal Protection for You and Your Family:

Listen to the radio or NOAA Weather Radio for the latest weather forecasts.

A “Tornado WATCH” means a tornado is possible in your area. Be exceedingly aware of the changing conditions.

A “Tornado WARNING” means a tornado has been sighted in your area and you should take immediate shelter.

Watch for changing weather conditions.

Know in advance where you will be safest in the event of a tornado. Move to the basement of the building that you are in. If the building does not have a basement, move to the center of the building away from windows. If you are in a high-rise building and can’t get to the bottom floor, go into a hallway in the center of the building. If you are in a mobile home, get out immediately and seek other shelter. Even mobile homes that have been properly tied down, offer little protection from tornadoes and should be abandoned.

If you are in your car, do NOT try to outrun a tornado. Leave your car immediately and seek other shelter. Do NOT seek shelter under overpasses. This is the level that most flying debris is at. If you are caught outside or in a vehicles, lie flat in a nearby ditch or depression.

Avoid using the telephone or computer and unplug unnecessary appliances.

Large hail can cause injury. Take cover immediately during a hailstorm.

After the tornado, check for injuries. If needed, apply first aid and get emergency assistance by calling 911.

If you venture outside after the tornado passes, watch out for power lines and stay away from damaged areas.

Listen to a battery-operated NOAA Weather Radio for further instructions.

Making Your Home Safe

Enhancing the construction of your home will minimize property damage to homes. Proper construction techniques and materials based on the most current model building codes can be used in both new construction and existing construction to reduce the damage from low to moderate intensity tornadoes.

If you have the means, build a safe room inside of your house. Order FEMA’s “Taking Shelter from the Storm-Building a Safe Room Inside Your House” #320. This booklet includes construction plans and cost estimates. You can get a copy by calling the Jefferson County Project Impact Office at 304-728-3329 or by calling FEMA Publications at 800-480-2520.

Other ways to protect your property from the force of tornadoes:

v Use common connections in wood frame buildings, such as anchors, clips, and straps to provide a continuous load path for all loads-not just gravity loads.

v Reinforce masonry walls that provide structural support to a building to resist gravity, lateral and uplift loads.

v Garage doors are highly susceptible to wind damage. Existing garage doors can be retrofitted to improve the wind resistance, particularly double-wide garage doors. Use of retrofits and installation of new reinforced doors should better resist wind forces, and as a result reduce roof and wall damage.

v Simplify construction to reduce uplift loads by incorporating simple roof geometries (such as hip and gable roofs with no dormers).

v Use adequate ties to foundations and roofs when reinforcing concrete and partially reinforced masonry. Make ties between concrete and other materials with drilled-in fasteners or cast-in-place fasteners.

v Use ring or screw-shank nails to fasten brick ties to increase nail pull-out resistance and prevent failure of brick veneer.

v Secure your chimney. Masonry chimneys that extend more than 6 feet above the roof, or have a width of 40 inches or more, should have continuous vertical reinforcing steel placed in the corners to provide greater resistance to wind loads.

If you live in manufactured housing:

v Permanently connect manufactured homes to its foundation to decrease damage from high winds. Significant differences in damages have not been observed between newer double-wide manufactured houses on permanent foundations and site built houses.

v Permanent foundations for double-wide manufactured housing perform better than both double-wide and single units on non-permanent foundations. Of those manufactured houses on non-permanent foundations, double-wide units appear to offer a greater level of protection. This is because these units are harder to overturn and have interior rooms, while rooms in single units all have at least one exterior wall.

v Seek shelter in a more secure location during storms is most important for occupants of manufactured homes. In the event of such storms, occupants of manufactured homes should follow the direction of emergency management and law enforcement officials and exit their home and seek shelter in storm cellars, basements, or above-ground shelters, when instructed to do so.