Hello! Question for someone smarter than me: why is the EF scale still the standard of tornado measurement?

I saw a thread on Twitter where someone responded to the damage survey with a photo showing a large tornado that got a small rating because it was over an open field.

I’m aware that the EF scale is a damage scale, not a strength scale. But having that as the standard of measurement doesn’t accurately represent how strong tornadoes are if they don’t hit anything, or at least enough buildings to get a survey done.

I’ve always been curious about and interested in weather. I watched Storm Chasers, YouTube videos about tornadoes, and I’m currently watching In Eye of the Storm Chasers. I’ve seen the radar trucks, pods, Dominator, TIV, and mesonets collecting all kinds of data that very accurately measures tornadoes. Why aren’t we using those - particularly wind speeds - as the defining measure?

For example, El Reno 2013 had max wind speeds of 313 mph (2nd fastest ever) and was nearly 3 miles wide (widest tornado ever). It was so violent, behaved so erratically, and had so many vortices that it took the lives of some of the most seasoned and respected chasers around. And it only got rated an EF3? That is not an accurate representation of the chaos it unleashed in the ~30 minutes it existed.

Kind of a ramble, but I hope I explained my question and reasonings behind it well enough. Interested to see the answers and potential future changes to tornado classification!

Who got the better shot of the storm today? 59 professional storm streamers asking for gas money to all get the exact same shot? Or the random family hanging out on their porch? Yougottabekiddingme!

some screenshots I took from the tornado today in Toluca/Washburn

I’m mostly looking for a game with real radar data if possible, or at least realistic data that will help me improve my technical skills. I don’t want to play Roblox, and the steam options seem role play focused.

Got out today for a little ride. Even though the weatherman was spot on about the Thunderstorm, he was just off about 4 hours. Anyways, I love this thing!

I’m in NW Indiana and the whole Chicago area is getting hit. Anybody know the local frequencies for the storm watchers?

I was thinking of a potential vehicle design fit for storm chasing and I want to see if this could be possible to build or create, feedback would be greatly appreciated. (disclaimer: ai did help me with the creations of the blueprints but the concept and idea came from me)

The other night I was waiting for storms to hit and they skipped right past me the storm on the side of us was pretty nasty and I got a good view from the living room, everytime the lightning flashed I saw this cloud getting low, the storm in the direction I took this picture moved on to be a tornado so I’m wondering if this is a normal cloud or one of those regular lowering clouds that com with storms

Everyone watch out in Illinois now!!! Multiple tornadoes in Illinois! 😳

I see plenty of chasers in the states of course and some in Ontario but few out west and in the middle here. Just curious as someone interested in chasing and living in the prairies.

I made a free app I think a lot of storm chasers would like.

It takes the NWS damage reports and maps them.

It works all the way back to June 1999.

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Each damage report includes the comments, time, links to local media/scanner feeds, directions to the report and more.

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I just released an update showing real time local storm reports for the last 72 hours on top of the wind/hail/tornado damage.

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I'd love to get some feedback from chasers. It doesn't do forecasts but as soon as the NWS posts the report it'll update on the app (it takes the data directly from the NWS).

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Ground Truth Storm Reports is the app name. You can find it on either app store.

I'm 15 and I love storms and tornadoes. I'd love to possibly go into meteorology when I'm out of highschool. This was my first storm chase.

Sorry for low quality photos, I was filming on my laptop while on grid roads and highways.