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April 26, 2011
Tracking tornadoes in Google Earth
With storms again ripping through the country, many of us are on the lookout for tornadoes. While it can't help you prepare for one, Tornado Paths, created by Perry Samson at the University of Michigan, is a great way to view the locations and paths of past storms.
By default it shows all of the tornadoes that have hit the United States in the past 48 hours, but it has a few other nifty features.
• View "Today in History", which shows all of the tornadoes that have struck on today's date in the past 61 years.
• Use the search box to let you see all of the tornadoes that have struck a particular zip code since 1950. Very interesting stuff! For example, I now know that a 1986 tornado came within a few hundred meters of our current house.
Of course, it makes excellent use of Google Earth too. By clicking the "View in Google Earth"
link from the home page, you can view the most recent tornadoes in Google Earth.
As you can see, the tornadoes have a nice 3D semi-transparent affect, and some cows flying around nearby in an apparent homage to the classic movie "Twister".
Have you had any close calls with a tornado recently? We've had some brutal storms lately, but fortunately no tornadoes too close to home.
Posted by mickmel at April 26, 2011 8:06 AM
Comments
Posted by: Jason Hunter at April 28, 2011 1:49 AM
One-Screen viewing of the history of tornadoes in a specific area could really provide some insight for high risk areas.
Posted by: Covert GPS Trackers at April 28, 2011 1:05 PM
I live in Atlanta. I had no idea that many tornadoes have hit this area since 1950.
Posted by: The Probing Company at August 26, 2011 2:12 PM
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I don't know what happened to the site but I can't get the link to http://www.tornadopaths.org/ to work at all.