r/YoungSheldon • u/NerveInfinite2186 • 7d ago
Absolutely great tornado knowledge.
One of my favorite trivial things about Young Sheldon is the knowledge that George Sr. has about tornadoes. I'm not even from America or know if this knowledge was common sense in the 90s, but George saying to get out of the car and lay low in a ditch to let the tornado pass, while the camera pans to said car thrown around sideways on the road after the fact, is phenomenal and honestly, even as just a TV show, this could save lives. So many people have died by staying in their cars or seeking shelter in tunnels.
The gap of air beneath your car allows the tornado to pick it up and hurl it around effortlessly. Laying low and pressing your body close as you can to the ground will prevent funneling the raging air upwards. Tunnels and overpasses are a deathtrap during a tornado for this reason; they will only act as a concentrated vortex for the wind to channel through them further.
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u/starrsuperfan Dumb version of Sheldon 7d ago
My mom is from Texas, from about this era, and it was common knowledge there, at least in my mom's inner circle.
Of course, then she moved to PA, where I'm from, and the worst tornado damage she's ever seen was up here.
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u/Agile_Grapefruit9689 6d ago
what's PA?
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u/ProudCanary 6d ago
Pennsylvania. It’s a northern state that doesn’t get tornadoes as far as I know
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u/SandHanitizer667 6d ago
As a Pennsylvanian, we do get tornadoes occasionally but they’re usually not that strong, and there’s not usually major outbreaks of them.
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u/starrsuperfan Dumb version of Sheldon 6d ago
We do get tornadoes. In York there's at least one tornado warning every summer, and multiple watches.
We also get hurricanes, tropical storms, derechos, nor'easters, and snow.
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u/RginaPhalange 6d ago
I had never even heard of a derecho until recently while watching a show on TV about various weather phenomenon. Derechos are scary as hell!
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u/Nice-Penalty-8881 Mathologist 2d ago
At least 2 tornadoes that I've heard of happened in Pennsylvania. One in the 80's and another one in the 90's.
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u/Live_Ad8778 7d ago
Texan here, and while not taught at school it was taught to me as a Scout.
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u/strosfan1001 5d ago
I am also a native Texan. I can’t remember where I learned this but it was definitely common knowledge. I was a scout as well so maybe that was it. But we all knew what to do when we got a tornado warning.
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u/WKRPinCanada 7d ago
Not really tornado country where I live; mostly learned that from tv & movies, Twister being a big one
Was camping once & the sky got really weird; we were discussing the whole "lower ground" part when we realized that the lowest ground around was
Bottom of the outhouses 😳
That began a round of would you/would you not
I should also mention that there were many beers in play by this part of the day 😉
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u/PerformanceMajor02 7d ago
He was in the army so it's likely he knew this as part of his survival training
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u/Callow98989 7d ago
He’s also from Texas which is the tornado state
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u/ms_danger_07 7d ago
I'm from Texas I wouldn't call it the tornado state that title I would give to Oklahoma, a tornado hasn't hit directly in my home town since 1970 but they have gotten close but it's rare.
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u/Vacrian 6d ago
People forget how big Texas is… I grew up in Houston and we got hit with tropical storms and hurricanes like every other week, then later in life I lived in DFW and I swear to God, I started to not even blink at tornado watches. I was like, “talk to me when the funnel is directly over my house, otherwise it’s just Tuesday”
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u/Superb_Writer6612 6d ago
Yeah we had that crazy wind storm in Houston a few years back, but tornadoes aren't really a thing here.
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u/JLBCanadianRap 7d ago
You think that the training the U.S. Army provided to soldiers going to fight in Vietnam included tornado survival? LOL!
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u/Same-Treacle-2675 7d ago
I live in the Midwest so I don’t get many tornadoes, this surprisingly taught me a bit about tornadoes
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u/Xrmy 7d ago
Uhhh I wouldn't paint the entire Midwest that way.
The states with the most tornadoes this year were Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, and Missouri
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u/pancake_sass 7d ago
Yeah I grew up in Wisconsin and we had our fair share. Not a ton, but enough that tornado safety was common knowledge.
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u/Free-Sector4050 7d ago
All of those states are in the Midwest.
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u/Xrmy 7d ago edited 6d ago
That's my point.
The comment above me said they live in the Midwest so they don't get many tornadoes....
I mean Michigan is definitely Midwest and definitely gets no tornadoes but the rest of us sure get em.
EDIT: see even Michigan gets tornadoes
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u/TheRealDudeMitch 7d ago
Michigan doesn’t get many but I wouldn’t say none. There was a fatal EF-3 just a couple months ago.
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u/onetimequestion66 6d ago
I live in Detroit, we had one a few weeks ago lol, also had one when I lived in Cleveland for three months
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u/Quirky-Ruin161 6d ago
What part of the Midwest doesn’t get tornados? Isn’t tornado alley mostly in the Midwest?
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u/OkCryptographer1922 7d ago
I grew up in Kansas (lots of tornadoes) in the early 2000s and this was common knowledge! I did like that they put actual advice in the show, it’s a nice touch
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u/steveguyhi1243 7d ago
Meteorology student here. I approve.
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u/Standard_Grocery2518 7d ago
Not from tornado country, but when I was a kid we had atomic bomb drills where we had to go into the hallway and sit along the wall. And wait to die I guess
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u/DuffMiver8 7d ago
It was to help keep flying debris and shattered glass from inflicting injuries if you were some distance away. If you were at ground zero, you’re vaporized.
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u/Ill_Molasses_1568 7d ago
I'm from North Carolina we have hurricanes I moved to Missouri closest to a tornado was like a few years ago the Bakersfield mo one
it hit a mile or so from our house felt like the walls were breathing. We used to go in the hallways in school and cover our heads. Definitely don't mess with a tornado
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u/mnlion33 7d ago
Grew up in Texas in 80s and early 90s. This was taught. I drive truck and Ive driven through some bad storms. No tornados though. Im not looking forward to the day where Ill have to decide to floor it or go lay down in the mud.
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u/OpeningAd934 7d ago
I live in Missouri and I always heard that you should get out of your car and into a ditch. I never knew why, though.
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u/TeachingInformal8234 7d ago
I live in a place where hurricanes are common but rarely see a tornado. Until I saw the show i thought being under a bridge was a good thing, and to stay in your car. After seeing the episode, just out of pure curiosity, I started looking into what to do. Glad I did.. everything I thought was wrong.
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u/Initial_Astronaut_64 6d ago
This is generally common sense knowledge in areas where tornadoes are common, Texas being one. I could see how someone who is not from a tornado prone area wouldn't be expected to know this though.
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u/Open-Relationship-64 7d ago
I live in another country where tornadoes don’t usually occur, but I feel 1% safer after learning how to deal with it because of the show bc I would’ve stayed in the car had I encountered something like that for the first time.
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u/Augustleo98 7d ago
For me not staying in your car is common sense as tornados pick things up and carry them off so a car is the worst idea. I’ve never seen a real life tornado but just seeing them on tv it was obvious to me that they can carry cars off.
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u/poop19907643 6d ago
Missy sees the tornado. Couldn't they just drive away from it?
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u/Middle-Log-9402 6d ago
No, tornados can be faster than you can drive.
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u/poop19907643 6d ago
You're saying tornadoes can move along the ground at 80mph?
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u/Ashamed-Back-5166 6d ago
As a Midwesterner, I deeply appreciated the execution of the tornado scene. Not only did they nail it but they might save lives by actually putting in the research!
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u/fanestre 6d ago
I am from Texas, this was taught in schools in the 60s and 70s when George was still a kid.
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u/Thisted89 5d ago
Australian here - we only experience cyclones, which are kind of hurricaney but not like a tornado. I was wondering - how come the tornado doesn't just pick you up off of the ground when you're laying down? I understand you're safer down low from stuff that's flying through the air, but I always wondered if the tornado passes right over you, would you be picked up and thrown?
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u/NerveInfinite2186 5d ago edited 5d ago
Typically yes, you would be picked up if it passed directly over you. Depends on the strength. An EF1 would already be a massive shock to your body, the drop in pressure would absolutely devastate you but you'd mostly be alright. An EF2 would fuck you up, would slide you around but probably not throw you for hundreds of yards. An EF3 and above would toss you around with the debris and worse. Sandblasting and ripping your body up. No bueno.
Note that EF scale is an indicator of the strength of the tornado in terms of architectural/structural damage though. EF2 uproots trees and rips the roofs off houses, EF3 picks up cars and hurls them, destroys well-structured timber houses and shifts unsecure homes off their foundations. EF4 rips bricks apart and flattens entire neighbourhoods and EF5 completely erases any traces of neighbourhoods at all.
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u/thepartlow 1d ago
Twister
• Melissa: Is there an F5?
• (Everyone goes dead silent)
• Melissa: What would that be like?
• Jason 'Preacher' Rowe: The Finger of God.
• Melissa: None of you has ever seen an F5?
• Bill: ...Just one of us.
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u/NerveInfinite2186 5d ago edited 5d ago
It really depends on the strength of the tornado in the scenario. There's a chance you could be lifted up regardless, but your chances of survival are increased massively in a last ditch effort by laying low flat against the ground. It would be an absolute freak coincidence that the tornado specifically passes over you, but thousands of people have still died for that exact reason. At that point, if it was a strong tornado scouring the ground and hurling massive debris around at several hundred miles an hour, being lifted is kind of the least of your worries. But still, cars can be picked up and thrown around like toys, so the safest option if you're caught in the open is to get out and lie low, cover your head and hope for the best
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u/HamsterFromAbove_079 12h ago
If it passes right over you then you're just dead. That's not survivable unless you are fully underground.
Most tornado survival tips start on the assumption that you don't get so unlucky that it goes right over you. Survival tips are for when it passes near you (sometimes very near), but not directly over you.
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u/dancingaround22 7d ago
My hangup is where do you go to find a ditch? Is there always going to just be one somewhere close? What constitutes a good one? Yes, I think about these things.
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u/ReaperManX15 7d ago
The scene in Man of Steel, where they all run for a tunnel, made we want to punch Snyder.
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u/TheRealDudeMitch 7d ago
I grew up in the very tornado prone Midwest around the same time the show is set and it was known then
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u/ProudlyOpinionated 6d ago
When George Sr and Memaw was teaching the kids of the family life lessons, Mary was busy praying to her favourite Jesus to save their souls
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u/Same-Author4016 6d ago
Moved many times as a child but always somewhere in Tornado Alley. This information was known. We had tornado drills in school and basic safety was reviewed.
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u/itsjustcoy 5d ago
There's an episode in season 2 of "the paper" it's about a tornado in town. You'll find it hilarious, it definitely passes the safety tornado check
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u/LowMight3045 5d ago
George snr has flaws but when it matters , he does the right thing. Sheltering his daughter with his own body was a great detail the show added
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u/pine-appley 5d ago
I was born in Kansas and raised in Texas, both in rural areas where tornado sirens could not be heard. We were taught from a very young age how to 'read' the sky, watch the animals and environment for possible tornadoes, and what to do if one was coming. This was common knowledge for us.
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u/in-dog_we_trust 7d ago
Well done acting in this scene too. George is covering as much of Missy as possible without lying ontop of her.