Tri-State Tornado, 1925

The Tri-State Tornado is the worst recorded tornado in U.S. history. It resulted in 695 deaths and traveled 219 miles across Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana. It tore through roughly nine towns and in such places as Annapolis, MO, 90% of the town was destroyed. In places like West Frankfort, IL, which was a mining town, the majority of the causalities were women and children, due to the fact that the men were all working in the mine at the time.

One strange thing about the tornado was that on the morning of March 16, 1925, many reported the skies as being "rainy and drizzly, with dark and gloomy skies". This was strange because the weather surrounding most other tornadoes is typically at least partly sunny. It turned out that the strange weather was because the tornado moved along a "triple point", which is the point between the warm front, cold front, and occluded (composite) front.

Despite the many casualties, the tornado also produced a few interesting stories, including one about a man who grabbed the front door handle on a house to hold onto and the rest of the house blew away, leaving him with just the door handle.











Picture: https://media1.britannica.com/eb-media/53/181053-004-104BD050.jpg
Article: http://www.ustornadoes.com/2014/03/18/the-tri-state-tornado-of-1925/