What Would You See Inside of A Tornado?

You hear a loud noise in the distance, and you know something bad is headed your way. You hurry to get somewhere safe, but before you know it, the storm hits - and there's a tornado right on top of you! What will you see inside one of these monsters?

While some tornadoes form rope-like swirls and others have wide clouds in the shape of a funnel, the most spectacular twisters are born in thunderstorms. Mexico joins the party too, as does the U.S. itself – with around 1,000 tornadoes per year. Texas holds the record for the most tornadoes per year with 120. Tornadoes can occur anywhere in Tornado Alley, which stretches from Midwest United States to Eastern Canada – though they are more common between April and June. Recently, tornadoes have been seen even in December. These powerful storms can ravage everything in their path, from large trees to cars – but seeing one is an incredibly rare opportunity that you don't often get to take advantage of.

Now let's take a moment to catch up, being in the middle of a raging tornado is actually something you might survive but I won't lie to you, it won't be easy. The first thing you'd sense would likely be the temperature changes inside this crazy twister, it can be 36 degrees colder than outside of it, that's because the center of the tornado funnel spins all the time, all that funneling makes the inside of the vortex way colder and it makes the airway thinner than you are used to. The air would be 20 percent less dense than for example what you would find at high altitudes. Now I hope you're not planning to stay there for too long.

Disclaimer here; the atmospheric pressure inside this swirling Vortex is so low that your lungs won't be able to extract enough oxygen. To give you a perspective, breathing inside a tornado is like trying to get some air at an altitude of 26 000 feet. That's a pro level, similar to climbing Everest, so yeah you'll need some help just to be able to take a regular breath. In short you'll probably pass out after only a couple of minutes.

Some storm watchers ended up inside a tornado later they said it all looks so chaotic with all those raging clouds and winds swirling around, but from the inside the air is surprisingly smooth but that doesn't mean you'll get a peaceful ride because of it, and it's not a solo party. The neighbor's motorcycle is not the only thing you'll see there; wood, bricks, glass, maybe even cars, cows, roofs, and other big objects.

You'd be pretty lucky if nothing crashes into you in all that chaos with all that debris curling at for instance 310 miles per hour. You can hardly avoid it but let's just say a miracle happens and you got through it, now you're really dizzy and you're just wondering when all of this is going to be over and if you're even going to be able to come out of this gigantic tornado, well the tornado will eventually slow down. It happens because cool air enters the twister. Just because things are settling down doesn't mean you can relax, because your stomach here since all that crazy swirling is done, but the tornado will drop you from whatever height you're on when it stops. If you're somewhere in the countryside there might be some soft bale of hay to break your fall, Oh wait we're talking about a twister that's probably more than 45 000 feet tall so that won't work. I hope you brought your parachute because now would be a good time to pop it.

Now you're slowing down enjoying the view, if you even see anything around you from all that dizziness. How come there are clear sunlit skies from your left? you may wonder, Well It's not unusual, tornadoes often form near the edge of a thunderstorm. It's like a border between different worlds and it wasn't even windy, plus the air was very still before it hit, right? well that's common too.

Okay I think you know this kind of scenario is impossible in reality, so it would be best to find a safe spot quickly if a tornado was close by. Use your underground shelter first and if you don't have one your basement could be the next best choice. Prepare ahead of time with a battery-operated TV or radio together with fresh batteries or a device with internet to be able to hear the latest updates on the tornado, include some non-perishable food, water and other essentials prepared too. As it turns out some people really were picked up by tornadoes and they managed to go through it. The tornado actually dropped them a few hundred feet away without a scratch, but you can't have a guarantee whether you'll be safe or where you'll end up. It would be incredibly hard to get out of one of those big and fierce ones though, like supercells they fall into the category of the strongest type of storms mostly thunderstorms and imagine falling into water spouts, those could be fine though at least the beginning because they're weak and they form over warm water so they could be like a part of your spa day at least until they move Inland and turn into a real tornado.

Now dust devils wouldn't be that pleasant, they're not that big but we're talking about columns of air that rotate at large speeds and you can easily see them because of all that dirt and dust they pick up, which is why you need glasses for that. If it makes you feel any better they're not associated with thunderstorms, I don't know why that would make anyone feel better when I think about it.

Bonus point: tornado extends from the ground up to the cloud and moves incredibly fast. Okay let's stop now I'm pretty dizzy.