Page 19 - Ef 4 News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Ef-4 and ef-5s. 95% are ef-1s that do a little damage. this is what we call a wedge tornado or a stove pipe. it's kind of hard to tell exactly, but this was an ef-4 or ef-5. it's just a massive tornado that was on the ground reportedly for four hours over 250 miles. we don't know if it was continuously on the ground, maybe it lifted occasionally and dropped back down. we won't know that later today or maybe even tomorrow, but when the lightning illuminates it, it's as scary as it gets. we know that this one, you can see there it just kind of looks like a wedge coming out of the lowering of the...

Hunkered down anyway and it's an exponential level of alarm that if you hadn't gotten to shelter you should have been because you had minutes or seconds left. >> you talk with this thing going on for 200 miles, is that common? do you see a lot of that in your career? >> no. this will -- only 1% of tornadoes are, like, ef-4 or ef-5. typically they're only on the ground for a little bit and this is what we call a long track tornado and it was at night. this could go down as one of the longest, strongest tornadoes we've ever recorded. ali, this is the middle of december and two weeks from christm...

Meteorologist bill karins who is covering this. bill, what do you know? >> well, we're starting obviously at daybreak. carrie is in kentucky and we're getting pictures in and letting the viewers know the way it works. the storm chases are out there and there are drones and pictures on social media that we have to get permission and we pay for them and then we'll show you the pictures. i've seen pictures and it looks like a bomb went off and it looks like an ef-4 went through downtown and we showed you the candle factory, but there are a lot of homes that have been destroyed through mayfield al...

Speculation, i think it's going to be an ef-4, could be 5, but really high end of the scale, so that doesn't typically happen anyway. so you have that time of month. you have the time of year. and you have the time of day. and then you also had the location. so, it was so far north. we weren't talking texas or florida outbreak. it was as far north as the ohio valley and we're usually talking about snow at that point, yasmin. >> michelle grossman, thank you. we're going to be checking with you throughout the two hours ahead. thank you for now. and thank you for picking up there as i went to bar...

Ground. foundation of the house. that's it. if a roof and structure remaining, it is lower than an ef-5. you see the damage that was done to the factory, that looks to be at least an ef-3 or ef-4. the picture of the courthouse in front of mayfield, the top of the building was ripped off. the building itself is standing. it looks like a brick building. the trees on the sides were stripped down to the bark in some cases and not a lot left. let's show you what happened. the first tornado warnings issued at 6:00 p.m. arkansas and missouri and st. louis residents knew it was a dangerous day. it was...