Prayers for the citizens Joplin, MO

[Aquarius]

As most of us know the city of Joplin was devastated by tornadoes on Sunday. I was listening to the podcast of my favorite morning DJs today and they said it literally looks like a nuclear bomb went off.

Worse, forecasters are saying more tornadoes are headed their way tonight. Authorities are stepping up efforts to locate survivors from Sunday's disaster before more destruction comes. 116 dead the last time I heard.

I hope a miracle happens and the tornadoes don't come. These people need a break, please.

[Honeybee]

It's just awful, isn't it? It's been a hell of a year for tornadoes. I'm looking over the check register to find more money for the redcross.org.

[Kathy Rose]

It's terrible. The pictures of the devastation are nothing like the city I remember from our brief stays there. Because we'd travel through in June or July, I remember how green the whole area looked, with trees and flowers, etc. Now it's just all rubble, and nary a tree to be seen in any of the photos.

[paulinem]

I haven't seen any of this, but I have seen the headlines. My heart does got out to everyone effected by the tornadoes. I'm sure they are feeling quite harassed and scared at the moment. I know, for me, after the floods here, every time it rains my stomach knots up. It's not a nice feeling which I'm sure the residents of those towns affected are feeling right now.

I shall keep them in my thoughts and close to my heart.

[JiNX-01]

I was shocked when I saw the reports. Just horrific. The devastation and loss of life is just stupefying.

I can't believe how crazy the weather has been. Floods, thunderstorms and rain almost every day, it seems. Unless of course you're living an area where there's a drought.

We had a very cold April. A couple of weeks ago neighboring counties in Central New York where I live here were even hit by tornadoes. When I was growing up, we never heard "tornado" in a thunderstorm forecast. Pretty scary. Especially since I don't have a basement.

[Honeybee]

We had a tornado here in Philadelphia last week. Very scary. It's crazy, this weather.

[Artisticmom2]

What happened in Joplin is...stunning... and I don't mean that in a good way. I wish I understood the recent increase in this sort of weather.

[Honeybee]

Yes. Climate science is very complicated, and it's always good not to jump in and blame climate change, which is a macro science, but that said - a couple of years ago the first tornado in Brooklyn happened and now we've had one in Philadelphia. It does look to the untrained eye like weather patterns are changing. Alabama, which got hit hard, is outside of traditional tornado alley.

However, there might be something else at work, and that's people simply not getting tornado warnings or ignoring them. Back when there were three channels and only local radio, a huge swath of the population was going to get the tornado warnings and likely heed them. Now, between the internet in general, video games, social media, satellite radio, smart phones - there's plenty more information options but you have to be looking for local warnings to get them. People are much more likely to ignore or miss news reports than they were twenty years ago. Apparently, there was a warning given in Joplin but the local high school was graduating and there were a number of other things going on in the town. A text alert just doesn't carry the same gravitas as a local anchor breaking into programming and telling you to get into the basement. There was a story on NPR about the national weather service being very aware of this and trying to come up with solutions. And CNN just posted this story:

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/24/jo ... ce/?hpt=T2

I know I get text alerts from my university, and I got one saying severe weather - students and staff are advised to take shelter. That was the first time I can recall that happening, previously the alert system was used for crime alerts and to announce snow days. I think that means they are trying, which is a good thing.

In other words, set your smart phones to get weather push alerts and heed them.

[Honeybee]

Double post but:

You can text REDCROSS to 90999 and a $10 donation will be given to the Red Cross, specifically to help the tornado victims!

[Aquarius]

How does that work, Honeybee? Do they just put it on your phone bill?