Tornados anyone? (Detroit, Grand Rapids, Flint: house, rent, high school)

[diamondgirl45]

I just read about the tornado in Arkansas and wondered if you get any/many tornados in Michigan.
While I was there last summer there was a warning, but nothing touched down that I know of.
Also do you have a warning signal, and do schools practice tornado drills?

When I lived on the west coast my kids had to do earthquake drills, but they thought they were fire drills. So, instead of going under their desks like all the other kids, mine lined up at the door, lol.

[Coldjensens]

We used to try to chase them when I was in high school. Really stupid. We just wanted to see one. Never did.

They happen here. My brother lived in a house that had the roof torn off. They are not real common though. Nothing like the plains states.

[Cliffie]

We get them more and more around here. We're getting them in places they have never been recorded before, even. There were 2 right on Main Street in the town where I live, and several in the backyard of someone I despise in another town. :-)

We use the air-raid siren to warn about a tornado. If there's time.

[burgler09]

Everytime theres a storm with a "tornado" I always try to find it with no success.

[gillgetter]

Most towns have sirens either mounted on poles around town or on top of fire stations that will sound when a warning is issued. Schools also have practice drills. pretty common to get a few tornado warnings in southern Michigan each year with some minor touchdowns tho some areas have seen some severe damage decades ago. I think last year we did have a fatality from a tornado near Lansing. Forecasters are predicting this spring will have more tornados, but we'll see. Our biggest problem is lake effect snow storms.

[Coldjensens]

just stay away from trailer parks and you will be fine. Tornadoes always attack trailer parks, they seem to hate them. Perhaps Tornadoes are architecture buffs.

[Northman]

Being a midwestern state, Michigan is always subject to tornadoes, but the other regional states get many more than we do. Wisconsin, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and even Minnesota all get a decent amount of twister reports each year. If a tornado does happen in MI, it's almost always in the southern LP.

Arkansas gets some terribly violent weather. Not as common to see those destructive t-storms in Michigan, although it's certainly not unheard of.

[cardwellave]

It seems like there used to be more 5 or so years ago. I don't remember having anything real bad in the past few years, at least in Metro Detroit.

I remember this time vividly:
Southeast Michigan Tornado Outbreak - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Tornado! July 2, 1997 -- Highland Park, Michigan (Click image for more pictures)

[burgler09]

I think a big f-5 tornado through detroit might make it look a little nicer to be honest.

[Wrinkle]

I was about 10 years old and went thru the tornado that hit on Alpine Ave in GRapids, in 1957. I saw the funnel coming in from the Southwest and watched it for what seemed an eternity. It danced from side to side, had some tremendous hall, my mother and I crouched under the stair well in the basement, and it seemed like a freight train was coming, the old farmhouse shook, and the wind roared. I think it was around 7 in the evening. It lifted the roof on the house, drove some two bys thru the living room, but no one was hurt. I remember going outside after it happened, the stars were out, and it was perfectly still. There was rubbish and litter as far as the eye could see. The National guard moved in shortley afterwards, it was a pretty devastating tornado, it must have been an f-3 or f-4, the farmhouse across the street was obliterated. At the time we lived next to the old greenridge golfcourse, which I believe isnt there anymore, and the next day, I wandered around the golf course picking up key chains from a hardware store 3 or 4 miles down the road.

Its scared me xithless, and will never forget it.

Along the west side coast of Lake Michigan, they arent very frequent. It seems the lake offers some protection, but I do remember golf ball size hall around the same time period.

I think the Grand Rapids area is probably more prone as its inland a little further where it picks up more fuel over land. The Flint area used to get some but thats been quite a few years ago.

We seem to get more wind, which sometimes uproots trees, but tornados on the West side along the lake are very rare.