A Question for all the European Folks

[kriadydragon]

Actually it's my mom's question. She's been curious as to whether or not tornadoes happen anywhere in Europe. I'm curious to know where else besides the US tornadoes happen. I know they occur in Australia but where else? Who else has to suffer tornado warnings, wall clouds, huddling in basements and leaky cellars and the terror of storm chasers screaming about how a tornado is heading right down the street you happen to live on? I hate tornado season :S

Comments

[tj-teejay.livejournal.com]

I must admit that, in all my waking life, I don't recall ever having born witness to a tornado except on TV. (Which I count as a good thing.) It's not entirely impossible that we might get one in Germany, but I don't recall ever having had a tornado sweep through here.

What we do get occasionally are bad storms. But they'll more be like thunderstorms. Heavy rain, gale-force winds, that kind of thing. It often causes for roof tiles to come loose, cellars to flood (so that the fire department has to come and pump the water out) or trees fall over and actually kill people (or damage the train tracks so that public transport becomes mayhem).

Upon checking wikipedia, apparently there actually are tornados in Germany, but I don't think they're ever as destructive as in the US. It probably has do to with climate-related things, because I understand that for a tornado to form, there needs to be certain weather circumstances.

And, yes, of course we also get storms warnings. But I've never had to hide in the cellar for one.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Upon checking wikipedia, apparently there actually are tornadoes in Germany, but I don't think they're ever as destructive as in the US. It probably has do to with climate-related things, because I understand that for a tornado to form, there needs to be certain weather circumstances.

Being very land locked as a lot to do with it, I believe, as well as the terrain. Mountainous areas like Utah do get tornadoes but not as often as areas like the midwest. Although Utah can get some pretty psychotic winds.

We have a basement now - a nice basement, thank goodness. In our old house we had a small, leaky cellar that was horrible to wait in. One time we even had a gas leak in the cellar, didn't even know it until we started getting light headed. We always semi-joke how that year that particular tornado actually saved our lives.

[swanpride.livejournal.com]

Urgh...I can't imagine. (I'm so happy that we don't use gas in our home at all).