Today is the anniversary of the 1957 Ruskin Heights Tornado. That F-5 tornado killed 44 and injured more than 300.  |
| Life magazine |
This monster tornado ushered in governmental tornado warnings (they had been invented by WKY-TV in Oklahoma City a few years prior) and it was the day that utterly changed my life. The above photo captures the horror. Not only had the couple lost everything, note that the house was stripped to the floorboards. That's what it looked like -- home after home of nothing but the floor and, perhaps, a commode or pipe spouting water.
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Homes stripped to the floorboards upper right.
Destroyed gymnasium at what was the new high school.
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For me, the tornado not only set me on my career to be a meteorologist, it played a role in me meeting and dating Kathleen and even where we would marry. Below is a photo of the original Martin City United Methodist Church. It was so heavily damaged it had to be torn down. We were married in the replacement church.
The tornado had such a profound effect on the region that three other meteorologists began their careers as a result. The late Les Lemon was a giant in tornado research. Dennis Smith was well known from The Weather Channel. Tragically, cancer took Tim Cox while still in meteorology school.
We'll never forget the victims of this storm. But, their lives clearly were not in vain. Not only are they profoundly missed, the adoption of tornado warnings across the nation and the research that led to better quality warnings has saved thousands and thousands of lives.
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