2011 Tornado Reports and Fatalities Trending Way Above Average in U.S.
Posted on May 5, 2011
The number of tornadoes in the U.S. in 2011 is running way above normal thanks to a very large number of tornadoes in April. On April 27, there were over 278 tornado reports in a single day. The second chart shows that 2008 may end up being an analog year for 2011 if May spawns another big tornado outbreak. You can see larger versions of these graphs here.
The death toll from tornadoes in 2011 is also way above average.
New Scientist has some informative charts here that show 348 deaths from tornadoes through April in 2011. This is already much higher than any year in the past 30 years. In 1975 there were 353 people killed by tornadoes. The next highest fatality figure earlier than that is 1953 when 487 people were killed by tornadoes in the U.S.More from Science Space & Robots