The Tonganoxie Split

[gblowfish]

I was talking to one of my customers today that lives in Valley Center, KS outside Wichita. He was telling me most of the heavy storms that head that way split, and the bad stuff either goes just North, or swings around to the south down by Andover.

West of KC there's a phenomenon I've been aware of since I was a kid called the "Tonganoxie Split." Same kind of deal. When a bad line of storms approaches KC, it tends to split in two, with the really bad stuff going just north or just south of the Metro.

Have you heard of that term, and what do you think? Is it a real thing? I believe it is!

https://www.reddit.com/r/kansascity/...s_radar_image/

[Nickhead]

Originally Posted by digger

Saw this is a search:

and the only fatality came a day or two later when a church roof was being repaired with an infant in a crib on the porch that collapsed, if i recall correctly.

[displacedinMN]

Originally Posted by Mr. Kotter

If a tornado is traveling along the ground, obstacles and geography can divert them to be sure. However, occasionally they drop down directly on top of a populated area. I've been places where it's occasionally happened, as recently at 3 yrs ago in Sioux Falls.

That was one bad ass tornado at 4am.

[Mr. Kotter]

Originally Posted by displacedinMN

That was one bad ass tornado at 4am.

Yep, ripped up a good stretch of one of the main business strips. Took almost 2 yrs for some of those businesses to rebuild.

[Hark Clunt]

I don't really understand the narrative that storms miss KC. I think what people mean by that is "big tornadoes", but the KC metro has had some hits over the years. You'll only see a huge tornado in the KC metro maybe once every 20-30 years. Even then, those kind of tornadoes are only about a mile wide and it's just weather roulette to see which neighborhoods get smacked.

[tmax63]

I lived in Hutchinson, KS for a year and the locals always about the weather either going just north or south but never hitting the town. The storms we had that summer did do exactly that. Radar show the storm heading straight at Hutch and it would veer off a mile or 2 west of town.

[Boiled Chicken]

Originally Posted by threebag02

I have always heard that rivers and waterways contribute to paths tornados take. Don’t know if it’s true or not but seems to work around my area.

Same…but, no

http://www.tornadoproject.com/safety/myths.htm

The Osage Indians, native to Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri passed on tornado legends to the early settlers. One such legend has it that tornadoes will not strike between two rivers, near the point where the rivers join. In the past 150 years, this idea may have given a false sense of security to some people who thereby failed to take shelter. They may not have lived to help debunk the myth. One by one, the myths that particular towns are protected have fallen by the wayside.

Emporia, Kansas, for instance, had sat “protected” between the Cottonwood and Neosho Rivers, in native Osage territory, for over a century. Emporia was free of damaging tornadoes until June 8, 1974 when a tornado killed six people and destroyed $20,000,000 worth of property on the northwest side of town. Another tornado did $6,000,000 in damage along the west side of Emporia on June 7, 1990. Part of the path of the 1974 tornado was also the site of a deadly twister on September 29, 1881, but the area was farmland then.

[TLO]

I've heard St. Joe folk talk about how the Missouri river protects the city from tornadoes for years.

Don't know how much truth there is to that, but we've never been hit by a powerful tornado.

[Fansy the Famous Bard]

Growing up in Lawrence 40+ years ago, the elder family members used to tell us that essentially the Eastern Kaw Valley here in Kansas has a little bit of protection from the Mega Tornadoes. Topeka-> West Metro has a "protection" path due to terrain from the river.

Something like that. I dunno how true that is.

[Marcellus]

I think there is truth to it but like anything else its not absolute.

If you have large elevations around an area forming a valley unless a tornado forms and drops in the bowl it will usually push around the elevations.

Its just a matter of odds really. I used to live in a valley that had storms coming down I44 all the time and they would almost always push west on the backside of the hills.

The Joplin tornado dropped almost exactly 2 miles dead east of my house but thats a ways away from the valley.

[Simply Red]

Originally Posted by Mr. Kotter

Yep, ripped up a good stretch of one of the main business strips. Took almost 2 yrs for some of those businesses to rebuild.

Good to see you Kotter

[JohnnyHammersticks]

Originally Posted by Renegade

We have the I-44 split, weather can vary on either side of it.

In Branson, we have a thing called "The Branson Bubble" Seems like it can be raining outside of the bubble and not in Branson, or visa versa

Same thing happens here in Phoenix

On the west side of I-17 it can be 115° while on the east side it might only be 113.9°

[KChiefs1]

Originally Posted by CaliforniaChief

Whatever dynamics exist in Andover, KS and Moore, OK, I would seek the opposite.

There may be something to it...I grew up in a town that was supposedly in a good place because it was between 2 rivers...until it wasn't good.

Meteorology is fascinating to me.

I’m sure this has been researched extensively by keeping track of the paths, length, location & wind velocity.


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[displacedinMN]

I can find track maps but nothing with great detail-too zoomed out. I will keep looking

[Rain Man]

I don't know why you people even have tornados. It seems like nothing good results.

[PHOG]

Originally Posted by JohnnyHammersticks

Same thing happens here in Phoenix

On the west side of I-17 it can be 115° while on the east side it might only be 113.9°

Well, there you have it. Definitive proof.