Tornados Hit Moore, OKC, Oklahoma, once Again

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Did that school have a storm shelter? If not, why? When a school or building is located in "tornado alley" why not build or retrofit a school or building with a storm shelter?

If I was to move to such an area, I would get a place that at least has an above ground storm room. And I wouldn't even think about a mobile home. Not that there is anything wrong with living in a mobile home. :)
 
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Did that school have a storm shelter? If not, why? When a school or building is located in "tornado alley" why not build or retrofit a school or building with a storm shelter?

If I was to move to such an area, I would get a place that at least has an above ground storm room. And I wouldn't even think about a mobile home. Not that there is anything wrong with living in a mobile home. :)

Your looking at $10K for a steel and concrete reinforced storm room to be retrofitted to an existing home. It's in that neighborhood for a concrete in ground storm shelter. Lots of new construction homes include the reinforced storm rooms, but that has only been started in the last couple years.

For the schools, if there is a retrofitting going on, then it usually includes a reinforced area, but in most small town areas of Oklahoma you have schools that were built during the WPA days and they don't have the budgets to afford multimillion dollar retrofits. Even in the big schools districts of the OKC and Tulsa metro, there are just too many buildings and not enough money to afford the retrofits.

Moore is in the middle of the large 6A school districts and it has over 31 school buildings and over 21,000 students.
 
Yeah, an atomic bomb.

With that kind of weather, it makes me glad I live here where the worst weather we get are the seasonal high winds, 100+ degree summers and little rain.

R.I.P. to all who lost there lives.
We were talking about that tonight at supper, just 130 or so miles as the crow flies east of you, the alley starts pretty much at the state line to the east give or take... sad to hear about those lost R.I.P.
 
If I was to move to such an area, I would get a place that at least has an above ground storm room. And I wouldn't even think about a mobile home. Not that there is anything wrong with living in a mobile home. :)


From looking at the pictures, anything but an in ground shelter and it wouldnt have mattered. Absolute destruction.
 
One of my wife's friends thought she lost her house, but once she got home, she found the house standing, all the windows blown out, a hole in the roof, her pool and backyard pretty much gone. But was relieved that the house itself - which is a month or two from being paid off - was still standing.
 
An above ground retrofit to an existing home would entail 18in steel reinforced concrete walls and roof and cutting the foundation out and digging 3ft deep footing walls. I'm not sure these specs would hold up against 200mph winds along with all the flying debris of an F4-F5.

My step sisters home has a shelter retrofitted into the garage floor. The only problem is you have to open the garage and move the car out before you can slide the door open and get in it.
 
If I lived in the area, I would consider connecting a used shipping container to the house so that it was mostly or completely buried. It would make a great home theater space and an effective storm shelter. Containers can be had very cheaply these days and are pretty much pre-fab for this application.
 
About a mile to the south of me a tornado touched ground across the road from some friends house 20 years ago, they have an underground shelter (one of the few around here I would guess)... the destruction in Moore is unfathomable from watching the news this morning.
 
The path of the tornado and the destruction caused are amazingly similar to the May 5, 1999 tornado that went through Moore.
 
Tornado Survivor Finds Her Dog During an Interview

It is always nice to see good happy events come out of horrible tragedies.

Wow! Amazing!

 
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Well our BKs are still without power and we do not know when it will come back... Thankfully it appears that all our crew members are accounted for, but some did lose their homes. The national news is all broadcasting across the street from one of our locations.
 
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