Wind and Tornadoes
Wind and Tornadoes
The highest estimated wind gust was in the range of 87-103 m/s (13 June 1924, tornado in Bia-Vác).
Highest recorded wind gusts: 44.5 m/s (3 August 1988, Szarvas); 44.2 m/s (12 June 1993, Szeged); 40 m/s (17 March 1994, Miskolc).
On 28 May 1993, a tornado touched down in the vicinity of Martonvásár-Ercsi, where the estimated wind speed may have reached 35-40 m/s.
The storm which occured at 7:22 PM on 12 June 1993 in the town of Szeged had great repercussions. According to some estimates, the damage caused by the storm exceeded HUF 160 million. The city centre, Széchenyi tér, was worst hit. A total of 3-5 thousand trees were uprooted by the storm and branches had been broken off some 25-30 thousand. Considerable destruction was recorded from the region’s agricultural areas as well, having been caused by the sudden gusts of wind, whose speed by 7:24 PM reached 44.3 m/s (160 km/h). This gale-force storm even exceeded the highest mark (Force-12) on the Beaufort Scale. Records show that walnut-sized hail fell for ten minutes. A storm with an intensity similar to the one in Szeged raged in Szarvas on 3 August 1988, during which 44.5 m/s wind gusts were recorded.
Tornadoes are air eddies with negligible horizontal dimensions, revolving at an extremely high speed, and born in storm clouds. They move at rates of 7-30 m/s, their updraft reach speeds of 20-80 m/s, their lifetimes range from a few minutes to maximum one hour, and they wreak havoc over distances of tens but, at the most, one hundred kilometres. Wind speeds in the center of the vortex can reach as much as 100- 150 m/s, i.e., 360-540 km/h. On average, two or three whirlwinds occur in Hungary each decade. The presence of warm and moist air masses is required for the formation of tornadoes: extreme instability and associated intense rainstorm activity, marked horizontal temperature and humidity stratification, and high upper-level winds. Tornadoes occur most frequently in the United States, Australia, the western part of Europe, the Apennines, the Carpathian Basin, and the Russian plains, but they have wreaked havoc in Japan, India, China, and southern Africa as well. The meteorological records in Hungary have noted 18 tornadoes so tar. The latest one occurred on 21 June 1996.
Late in the afternoon on 21 June 1996, several tornadoes were born in the same gigantic thundercloud as it passed over the northern part of Somogy county, Zala county (between 5:15 PM and 6:45 PM), and the region between the Rivers Danube and Tisza late at night (between 8:00 PM and 9:00 PM at Izsák-Kiskőrös-Akasztó). The (most powerful and destructive) Somogy county tornado lasted 14 to 20 minutes, its maximum wind gusts were estimated at 50-70 m/s, the estimated width of its path was 100-150 m, and the length of ifs course was 15-20 km (in a south-easterly direction).
