Three tornadoes on Black Friday! (Paradise Valley, Queen Creek: neighborhood, tornado, living in)

[Ponderosa]

The NWS confirmed three tornados yesterday. There were two in Queen Creek and an EF1 in Paradise Valley. We are becoming Oklahoma. Multiple tornadoes are not unheard of but not common either.

And FWIW, I and others have taken the NWS to task for over-predicting storms, but in fairness, I have to hand it to them. They got these last two storms nearly perfectly predicted. This second was a bit late, but otherwise they called it right.

And we have had a couple of soakers that we really, really needed. Let's keep it up, mother nature. To heck with the snowbirds.

[KathrynAragon]

Here in NE Texas we are supposed to get that weather today - like you, I'm saying BRING IT ON!

[exit2lef]

I'm glad there were actual tornadoes to justify the 4 AM alert on our mobile phones. It was definitely an interesting way to wake up way too early on a day off.

[goolsbyjazz]

All the action happens when I leave town!

[ElleTea]

One of them went through my neighborhood.

At exactly 4 AM I was woken by a very loud sound, it sounded like 40 huge trucks speeding down my street at once. I very loud rumbling, but worse than that. Hard to explain. I couldn't figure out what the heck was happening! I sleep with a fan on year round so I normally don't hear anything outside, so it had to be loud for me to be able to hear it, let alone wake me up!

I had no damage at my house, but a couple of blocks away an AC unit and part of a roof was blown off a building and dropped in someone's yard. Lost of uprooted trees not far away, too.

I just think it is funny that I live in the Midwest, in Tornado Alley even, for my entire life before moving here and this is the closest I have ever been to a tornado. In Arizona!

[MN-Born-n-Raised]

Originally Posted by ElleTea

One of them went through my neighborhood.

At exactly 4 AM I was woken by a very loud sound, it sounded like 40 huge trucks speeding down my street at once. I very loud rumbling, but worse than that. Hard to explain. I couldn't figure out what the heck was happening! I sleep with a fan on year round so I normally don't hear anything outside, so it had to be loud for me to be able to hear it, let alone wake me up!

I had no damage at my house, but a couple of blocks away an AC unit and part of a roof was blown off a building and dropped in someone's yard. Lost of uprooted trees not far away, too.

I just think it is funny that I live in the Midwest, in Tornado Alley even, for my entire life before moving here and this is the closest I have ever been to a tornado. In Arizona!

When did you figure out it was a tornado?

[ElleTea]

Originally Posted by MN-Born-n-Raised

When did you figure out it was a tornado?

Well, I had a good idea when I checked my phone right away and there was a tornado warning. The warning pinpointed exactly where the threat was using cross streets and it was close.

I then pulled up the radar on my Weather.com app and could see where it likely was. Living in the Midwest and watching enough severe weather reports has taught me what possible tornado rotation looks like, and I could see the hint of the "hook" the radar shows when there is rotation. At that point I didn't completely think it was a tornado until later in the day when the NWS confirmed that there was, then I was able to piece it all together. As the day went on Friday I learned about damage in the area from posts on Nextdoor.

[ajonesaz]

The one in the San Tan Mall Area went right over my house. I got the alert 5 minutes after it had passed over. The wind sounded different than a regular microburst or monsoon storm. Damage was slightly different too. Only real damage was a few downed trees in the path and a few neighbors shade structures. I had a few things in the back yard that looked picked up and moved, but not blown over. Wierd. I heard it was an EF0 so we have probably had worse wind speed wise during the summer.