Film - The Day of the Killer Tornadoes (B)

Here, in its entirety, is a short documentary film from the Civil Defense Agency that figured very prominently in my childhood. That's primarily because I lived through the Huntsville, Alabama portion of it. The quality of the film is not great (it wasn't even by 1970s standards!) and some of the re-enactments using the acutal participants are unintentionally humorous but the event it records - the 1974 Super Outbreak - was dreadfully serious. 148 tornadoes (the most ever in a single weather event) struck the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys in a single day, killing 330 people.



This next section includes the town of Xenia, Ohio, which was virtuallly erased by an F-5 tornado that day. It concludes with extensive actual footage from the Huntsville area.


The Huntsville material - and the film - concludes here:



More detailed information on the Super Outbreak is available at http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/storms/