Jake Hughes- Module 8

  1. The event that I plan to write about for this module is about a tornado in the USA on March 31st, 2016. The tornado touched down in the northern part of Alabama. The tornado touched down around 7:07 p.m. on Thursday. Luckily, there were no reports of any damage. The National weather service also issued a few tornado warnings for a few counties near there. After the first tornado in Alabama, another one touched down in the state. It struck Eldridge, Alabama around 8 p.m. There were also no reports of any damage or injuries.

I live in Uniontown, PA. The town is located about an hour south of Pittsburgh. Tornadoes aren’t as big of a threat to PA as they are the south, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t get any. There are about 12 tornadoes on average, per year in Pennsylvania. Yorks County, Adams County, and Lancaster County get the most tornadoes in PA. None of which are close to my hometown, so it is rather unlikely of us getting hit with many tornadoes. My hometown could experience such a disaster though. This scale of natural disaster in Alabama would be a little large for Uniontown. Uniontown’s population is minimal in comparison. A tornado of this size would demolish my whole town. The amount of damage could possibly be double in my hometown. Based on the geography of my hometown, the people living up in the mountains would be affected in a different way in a tornado hit. If everyone knew of the disaster, we could implement a way to get everyone to the upper side of the mountain where they may be less likely to get injure by its effects. The multitude of houses and developments between the mountains would create a funnel for the tornado to rip through.

(reference-  http://www.homefacts.com/tornadoes/Pennsylvania.html )

  1. The disaster that I mentioned in the first paragraph is quite likely to happen in my hometown. The other likely disasters would be flooding and snow storms. In my personal experience, I have been snowed in the house for almost a week. I also got out of school for 2 weeks before. In 1950, Uniontown and the tri-county area received its largest blizzard of all time; leaving 26-28 inches of snow. (heraldstandard.com) My friends and I can all still remember when there would be major floods from the mountains that would put us all out of school and even shut some stores down.

Resources:  ( http://www.heraldstandard.com/online_features/snowstorms-welcomed-by-sled-riders/article_a759dd8f-9036-585a-81ef-beb04c27103a.html )

  1. The natural disasters within the city of Uniontown could be handled a little better, but from the years and years (dating back to 1950 just in what I have wrote alone) of experience we have produced greater reactive and proactive abilities. Uniontown has many salt deposits running up and down the mountains and major roads. Sometimes we will experience several inches of snow over-night and still attend school the next morning. PennDot is primarily the best choice for treating the roads. They are always out clearing our roads during the winters. I could easily volunteer with firemen to clean the roads up a little bit before the school day started. I could even help local businesses with their parking lots to ensure them of opening.

2 thoughts on “Jake Hughes- Module 8

  1. Hey Jake, I’m Tyler. Here’s a link to my post: http://geog030.dutton.psu.edu/2016/04/01/module-eight-vulnerability-reduction/
    I liked how you mentioned tornadoes and how mountains offer protection. My hometown is in Zone Two for tornadoes but I find it hard to believe that a tornado could make its way around the many nearby mountains. I also liked your paragraph about how the roadways are attended to after a snowstorm. My hometown is in a rural area with a lot of elevation changes and the roads are cleared much better on some occasions than others. Driving in the snow is probably the biggest natural struggle for residents of my hometown.

  2. Hey Jake,
    My name is Jordan, you can read my post here: http://geog030.dutton.psu.edu/2016/04/01/module-8-hazards/

    I didn’t know that there was a recent tornado in Alabama, so I was glad you picked something in the homeland that is news relevant. It is interesting to me what kind of hazards get reported nationally, and which ones do not. I was struck by your comment about people in the mountains being affected differently, but I would guess that it is the mountains that keep the winds from picking up at such high speeds in your area and actually prevent such massive storms. I live in Los Angeles, and we don’t have Tornado systems for similar geographic reasons. Thanks for sharing your post.
    -Jordan

Leave a Reply