In Situ, Doppler Radar, and Video Observations of the Interior Structure of a Tornado and the Wind–Damage Relationship

Abstract

servations of the winds inside a tornado were obtained with an instrumented armored vehicle, the Tornado Intercept Vehicle (TIV), and integrated with finescale mobile Doppler radar (Doppler on Wheels) data revealing, for the first time, the structure of the near-ground three-dimensional wind field in and around the core region of a strong tornado, and permitting comparison with conceptual models. Inward and upward spiraling near-surface flow, upward motion near the surface, and an axial downdraft aloft are documented, as well as a periodic oscillation in tornado intensity. Simultaneous video documentation of damage occurring during the tornado is related to the direct wind observations, permitting the first comparisons of the time history of damage to the time history of directly measured winds and a limited evaluation of the underlying assumptions and quantitative relationships in the enhanced Fujita (EF) scale.