Minnesota Tornado Outbreak

Brianne Bilyeu, , ,

Last night’s weather was wonky in Minneapolis.  We got about 60 seconds of either hard rain or hail – when we went outside 30 minutes later the ground was dry…  And the sky was yellow.  I mean yellow.  It’s hard to capture a cloudy, yellow sky with a digital camera – all of mine tried to auto-correct – but one of my friends managed to get a good shot and posted it to her FB account:

At 9pm it was so light out that it felt like 6 or 7pm. 

Tornados ripped across many parts of Minnesota last night, but in Minneapolis the weather remained fairly calm.  We did have some high winds in the early evening, but not much else.  At about 9:15pm The Hubby and I went walking in the oddly bright, balmy, 80-degree evening.  We found this telephone booth outside of an antiques shop on Lyndale Avenue.  It looked great with the dark blue, cloudy sky in the background. 

Details from last night’s tornado outbreak in greater Minnesota:

There is already a wikipedia page devoted to the Mid-June 2010 Tornado Outbreak.  Remembering that this is Wikipedia, and knowing that I haven’t fact checked the info, here’s what they have to say: 

Affecting mostly Minnesota and North Dakota, the system produced a total of 62 tornadoes reported across four states while killing at least three people, all in Minnesota.

The page also has a table started that is listing EF#, Location, County, Time and Comments/Damaged caused by the tornados. 

From twincities.com:

A funnel cloud forms near Grand Forks International Airport Thursday afternoon June 17, 2010. A number of tornados were reported in the northern Red River Valley of North Dakota and Minnesota into the evening Thursday. (Associated Press/The Grand Forks Herald: John Stennes)

From Cleveland.com:

A large funnel cloud touches down west of Albert Lea, Minn., early Thursday evening.

Youtube has several videos of last night’s tornados.  I thought this one of a tornado in Winsted, MN by mkastavitch was fairly decent:

And this video by SlayerWalleye (that’s a Minnesotan user name, eh?)  shows some of the devastation caused by a tornado that tore through Wadena, MN:

{advertisement}
Minnesota Tornado Outbreak

About the author

Thoughts from a Minneapolis-based nerdy, liberal, humanist progressive on topics such as science, skepticism, religion, atheism, critical thought, politics, and local and global humanitarian and equality efforts. Biodork <3's geek culture, groan-inducing puns, world travel, cultural exchange and sharing and listening to stories.
{advertisement}
The Orbit is still fighting a SLAPP suit! Help defend freedom of speech, click here to find out more and donate!

27 thoughts on “Minnesota Tornado Outbreak”

  1. cafewitteveen
    Reply
    1

    Stay as safe as you possibly can, Biodork.

    That first shot is so cool. Way to go with grabbing the color.

    About a week ago we had a storm early one morning. Just before the storm, I was up to empty my bladder and I saw the ominous color outside, and if it weren’t for a desperate need for more sleep, I would have gone outside to shoot it.

    I did a documentary on the aftermath of a Level 5 Tornado that hit Kansas five years back. They are some ruthless beasts.

    Best,

    Jeremy

    P.S. I have a hot tip for racking up hits. Post any one of the zillion vuvuzela jokes being posted on the Internet, and then tag it “vuvuzela joke or jokes”. Maybe there’s a science related one. I’m curious to see what you get. I’ve been getting mad hits from the tag. I’ve had over 150 just today!

    1. biodork
      Reply
      1.1

      Yes – she did a great job of capturing the green, although the flash is a little bright in the near foreground. (Better than I got though!)

      RE: Vuvuzela jokes – I might try that. In the name of science, of course, lol!

      1. cafewitteveen
        Reply
        …

        The shot may not have turned out if it weren’t for the flash and that damn tree. If the flash didn’t hit anything, the camera may have done an auto white balance and made the yellow appear not so yellow.

        I’m assuming that the camera was a point and shoot. So while the bush with it’s flash of light is a bit off putting, it may be the reason why a point and shoot captured the color.

  3. jana
    Reply
    3

    Awesome! (I mean, thank goodness you and yours are OK, but – wow!)

    I’ve become obsessed with weather because (a) I don’t work (b) I only have antenna TV (c) the weather changes constantly (d) from central Europe with it’s predictable weather I moved to Toronto, city limits of which only a few storms dare cross – hence, I had no previous experience with crazy weather.

    Several lines of storms crossing central Indiana a week ago have inspired me to write an article about weather patterns here, but I simply have too many questions and can’t seem to find the answers (or people willing to talk about weather who don’t think I’m nuts).

    I would have most likely died of excitement had I had the chance to track 62 tornadoes on Doppler/TV. Midwest weather rocks!

  4. agatha82
    Reply
    4

    How surreal to see an English telephone box in Minnesota. Of course, here in London, we’re used to those 🙂
    I know all about the yellow sky, when I used to live in Miami Beach, we once had a tornado and I remember the yellow sky right before it happened…great pic but scary stuff!

  6. Courtney
    Reply
    6

    That yellow sky was absolutely insane, wasn’t it? I just caught the end of it when I was walking out of class last night at 9:00 pm, when it was also SO LIGHT OUT! It was brighter walking out of class than walking in at 6:00 pm. Totally bizarre. The clouds after the yellow sky were crazy, too…did anyone get a shot of that?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *