TornadoHistoryProject.com

Though this announcement is a little late, effective April 15, 2013 the Tornado History Project added tornado data for 2012*. There were 940 confirmed tornadoes last year, which is the lowest annual number since 2002 registered 932 tornadoes. The total number of tornadoes mapped on this site (covering the period 1950-2012) now stands at 57,154.

There were also a relatively large number of changes to tornadoes in prior years, but unlike similar updates in the past, a itemized list will not be given. Instead, if you have previously downloaded data, simply re-download to get the most up to date information.

* Raw data has been provided by the Storm Prediction Center (SPC).

As usual, when the SPC edits or adds data to their historical tornado data, the changes are carried over to the Tornado History Project. Here is a summary of recent changes:

• 19790410.48.37 – width changed to 150
• 19790410.48.40 – width changed to 1056
• 19790410.48.43 – width changed to 1320
• 20110427.1.109 – fatalities changed to 25
• 20110427.1.100 – fatalities changed to 14

As explained in Data updates – part 1, the SPC periodically updates their historical tornado file, and when they do, the Tornado History Project carries those changes over. This is part 2 of 2 of a detailed list of those changes:

• 20050629.25.1 – length changed to 0.1
• 20050829.13.28 – length changed to 0.1
• 20051115.1.75 – length changed to 0.3
• 20060113.13.9 – length changed to 0.1
• 20060613.12.12 – length changed to 0.1
• 20060613.13.15 – length changed to 0.1
• 20060814.35.2 – length changed to 0.1
• 20070505.20.66 – Stafford added to counties
• 20070926.42.7 – damage changed to 75,000
• 2009 tornadoes – all tornadoes were given new tornado numbers (or ‘om’ number as explained in the SPC documentation; in any case, the unique index numbers created by the Tornado History Project have not changed)

As noted in an earlier post, the SPC recently made changes to the pre-2011 historical files. Here’s a list so far, covering the period from 1950-2004. All the changes noted are already live on this site. There will be a future article for the 2005-2010 changes.
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The SPC has made some changes to the 2011 data, which have been carried over here. While the tornado count changed for two states (1 more for Oklahoma, 1 less for Tennessee), the total tornado count for the year remained the same. A list of the changes:
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The Tornado History Project is happy to announce that year 2011 tornadoes have been added to the database*. There were 1692 tornadoes logged last year, which makes it the 2nd highest annual total on record. This brings the total number of tornadoes mapped on the site to 56,221, covering the period 1950-2011.

Unfortunately, it was also a very deadly year with 550 fatalities and 5479 injuries. To put that into perspective, the total number of fatalities for the previous ten years combined was 563. Some of the most notable tornadoes of the year were this F5 tornado that struck Joplin and surrounding areas in Missouri, and this F4 tornado that struck Tuscaloosa and surrounding areas in Alabama.
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Just noticed that the SPC made a very minor edit to their historical data file. As always, this change has been carried over to the Tornado History Project.

The tornado in question is 19681117.28.13, where the lift-off coordinates were changed from 30.8,-88.92 to 31.67,-89.93. While the data has been updated, this had no effect on the map since the approximate path was reproduced with data from the NCDC (see Enhanced Paths Explained), which already had the correct coordinates.

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Just a quick note to announce that year 2010 tornadoes have been added to the database*. There were 1282 tornadoes added for last year, which caused a total of 45 fatalities and 701 injuries. The most noteworthy tornado of the year is this F4 on April 24 that tore through parts of Mississippi and Louisiana killing 10 and injuring 146 while causing an estimated $386 million in damages.

With this latest update, there are now 54,529 tornadoes to explore at the Tornado History Project.

* Thanks to the SPC for collecting and providing the data.

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As you may know, the Tornado History Project uses data from the Storm Prediction Center’s (SPC) historical archive to generate maps and tables. So when the SPC updates their archive with new stats and information, the Tornado History Project incorporates those changes into our database. A quick summary of the recent changes follows:

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Just a quick note to document a few changes to the database where the SPC has modified data for past years:

• 19710812.32.1 – county changed from White Pine to Clark
• 20000213.13.3 – number of fatalities changed from 6 to 7
• 20061225.12.42 – Fujita rating changed from 0 to 2

A number of changes were made to 2008 records:

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