Remembering the May 20th Moore Tornado

Today is the one year anniversary of the EF-5 tornado that hit Moore, Oklahoma.

The storm killed 36 people, 7 of whom were children; almost 400 people were injured, and billions of dollars worth of property was damaged. There has been quite a bit of coverage of the storm today from a variety of media outlets, including several stories detailing how the recovery efforts are going.

I wrote about my own experiences of the tornado not that long ago; if you're interested, you can find my account here.

Moore is the birthplace of the Tornado Emergency designation, used during the 1999 EF-5 tornado that also hit the city. In fact, the paths of the two storms are eerily similar. While that designation has since been used across the United States, I believe Moore is the only city to ever have it issued twice.

The National Weather Service in Norman Oklahoma has an excellent recap of the events of the storm, including their forecasts leading up to the day of the storm and the full text of their warnings on not only their own site but social media as well.

Two other recent media pieces concerning the storm are worth checking out:

1. NBC News has a whole collection of video, interviews, and articles about the storm. 
2. The Washington Post has a great gallery of pictures showing scenes from right after the tornado and what those same places look like a year later. This one in particular tells the story of how long it can take for a community to recover:

As for me, while I may no longer be a resident of Moore, I am so grateful to the teachers, first-responders, good neighbors, and churches that gave so much in the face of such tragedy. I consider it an honor to have been a part of such an amazing community.

Thanks for reading.