At a young age, while in the barn milking cows I had a tornado go over my head. It just sounded like a strong wind to me. Why is it when you see a feature on the news that people on camera say it sounded like a freight train? Why don’t they say it sounded like a passenger train, or a Lionel train, or a pig train, or Santa Clause reindeer running fast, or a herd of Senators chasing a 22 year old blonde?
Probably because 1. they’re looking for an example of very, very, LOUD, with a continous element, and a freight train fits the bill, and 2. because they’ve heard other people describe it the same way.
From experience, I have noticed high winds mirror the sound of a freight train, even to teh point of the vibrations you can feel. I believe it is actually an accurate comparison. Not all instances will sound like that, but many do.
Would it not then be as accurate to say that freight trains sound like tornados?
lol, nice one
If I’m somewhere outside of town, where there’s not a lot of others sounds competing with the train sounds, an oncoming train sounds a lot like a big group of Harleys.
A couple of weeks ago, we were on a small tourist boat going up Splitrock Creek in Garretson, S.D. There is a good sized hill on the BNSF line running parallel, about a half mile away. The sound of a freight running up the hill was an awesome roar. Our tou rguide had to reasure everybody that it was just a train.
Back in May 2000, an F2 tornado started forming just after the storm passed over my parents’ house. I, naturally, grabbed my camera and went outside. We could see it touching down in the distance, about two miles away. From that distance, the winds were more of a hissing sound.
In early 1986 when I was a kid, we had a storm go over our house that was supposed to have had a tornado in it. We were in the basement when the winds picked up, strong enough that the basement floor was vibrating and light cords were beginning to sway. The wind in the storm did sound like a roaring sound, very comparable to standing next to a fast moving freight train. And it was loud like a train, so loud that I could barely make out my little brother screaming that we were all going to die.
Kevin
Certainly, in the minds of a couple who had just moved to Wesson, Miss., in 1962. Their house was south of the first public crossing, and the first evening they were in the house, they heard what they believed to be a tornado approaching, and they dove under their bed. When they heard the engineer of the Panama Limited blowing for the first crossing, they realized that it was train, and not a tornado (their house was just across the street from the track). When a passenger train goes through your town at 79 mph, it makes quite a noise. They did become accustomed to its passage, as well as that of #'s 1, 2, 4, and 6. #3 stopped occasionally, and #'s 25 and 8 were scheduled to stop. The freights did not run quite as fast, with a speed limit of 59 mph.
My house was also just across the street from the track, but I knew the track was there.
Johnny
Not too long ago, someone posted a You Tube link in this forum to a freight train having some cars knocked over by a tornado including sound. I wonder if the crew thought the tornado sounded like a freight train?
Rich
You mean this video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFe0846RgWc&feature=related Not my video.
Tree It has occured to me that everyone has missed the obvious. In your description a very very loud with a continous element. That has just described 40% of all girlfriends and 98% of all wifes. But then again for years they gave hurricains girls name until the Gay movement came along.
It was not the “GAY MOVEMENT”, Wabash, that brought women’s names to hurricaines but the womans movement of the 60’s and 70’s. Please take the “bash” out of your name.
Henry, should you not say that it was the woman’s movement of the 60’s and 70’s that brought men’s names to hurricanes? As I remember, for many years women’s names only were assigned to hurricanes, but this practice came to an end comparatively recently.
Johnny
The rest of the statement I edited out was “then they started givng them guys names.” also I am not going to fight with you today. Sorry to spoil your sick fun, but its just not going to happen .
The Japanese have a simple answer to, “What do we call this typhoon?” They give them numbers.
Does a hurricane sound like a Hurricane? (Or Spitfire, or Mustang, or Lancaster?) Not in my experience - and I’ve experienced quite a few hurricanes. They just don’t have that beautiful Merlin snarl…
The same phenomenon in the Indian Ocean is called a cyclone. Since most of the noise of a Cyclone is actually generated by the propellor, and there’s quite a bit of wind astern of a Cyclone-powered aircraft when the engines are turning at high RPM…
And then there’s the PanAvia Tornado, which, if you’re on the ground and it’s airborne, doesn’t have the continuity of an Oklahoma tornado.
Do any of them sound like a freight train? Not one running on jointed rail, they don’t.
Chuck
It was to grant “equality” and make things “even”. It was not for the "gay"s that the names were added but to appease those who were seeking an equlibrium. Since “himmacaines” was out of the question, it was decided to alternate male and female names. Gay equality or whatever had nothing to do with it…unless you’re homophobic and want to think so.
Back to the original question…I think many folks are missing the point by referring to a high wind or a funnel cloud going overhead.
A tornado is a funnel cloud that has touched ground. When it does so it creates devastation, grinding things up and causing a tremendous sound and vibration in the ground…a sound and vibration just like a freight train rumbling by you does. That’s what people are thinking about when they refer to a tornado sounding like a freight train. They’re not saying that a high wind blowing by them sounds like a train.
it is true. there is the clacking sound we hear from trains. this happens when the tornado is very near and or very powerful. at other times it sounds like a jet plain.
Wow! Something just went through town that sounded like 0.25 tornadoes! Could it have been a…freight train?
Remember the good ol’ days when there was a scale for describing freight trains, too? F3…F7…F9…F9B…
That’ll throw the “storm chasers” for a loop - “That one was as loud as a set of A-B-A F7’s !” (since the ‘modified’ Fujita Tornado Intensity Scale only goes up to F5, I believe . . . ). [swg]
- Paul North.