Tornado Path

The Omaha World-Herald newspaper posted this image of the tornado path and strength. If you look at the lower left of the graphic, that first neighborhood it goes through is where Mickie & Chad live. It initially touched down maybe 4 or 5 blocks southwest of their home as the crow flies. That's a bit too close for comfort! Add to this that the National Weather Service botched their job and didn't even issue a tornado warning until 2:26 a.m., 9 minutes after the tornado initially touched down.

What boggles my mind on this is that I know when I lived in Oklahoma the National Weather Service issued tornado warnings based on radar, not on spotters, because you can't always trust the eyes or location or visibility of a spotter, especially at night. The radar images and the wind patterns indicate whether or not a tornado is forming. We know this now based on all the years of research, much of it based out of Oklahoma University in Norman, OK. I'm bothered that the personnel here didn't issue a warning when they could have as a precautionary measure. We're very fortunate nobody was killed in this.