Link to May 5th North Texas Tornado Summary
“Within 8 hours 16 tornadoes were spotted within an area located two hours west of Dallas, TX. Within that time there were at least 6 fatalities, over a hundred injuries and dozens of single-family homes damaged or destroyed. Mobile homes were blown off their foundations, and the slab of site-built homes were swept clean. The National Weather Service assigned an EF-4 rating to the most powerful tornado in Granbury, TX, and lower ratings to others. At this time, there’s limited photographic evidence available online for most of the damage but from the available information, similar failure patterns as were observed in the 2011 tornado outbreaks in Tuscaloosa, AL and Joplin, MO are apparent. The damaged homes, constructed as light-framed wood structural systems, lack component of a vertical load path (i.e. metal hurricane ties, large steel washers on wall plate anchor bolts) that could have given some homes a “fighting chance” to survive a tornado…(Continue reading)
