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Tornados and Stairs

The Donkey

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Sep 21, 2006
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My mom called a few hours ago to let me know there was a tornado warning in our area. Turns out no twisters in our little berg, just alot of hail, lightening and thunder. Nowhere to go anyway in my home but the bathtub because our house is all one floor. The storm was headed up mom's way but she is better off as far as tornados are concerned. My parents have a house with a basement.

According to the actuaries, the chances of dying by tornado are rather high in the US -- about 1 in 60,000 per year. Suppose I should have thought about that before I moved here, huh?

Then again, nobody is really that good at thinking about risk. A Dutch study found that those somewhat less dramatic falls down stairs kill about 1 in 1,700 in the Netherlands per year.

The US versions of those falls have taken away a few good friends of my family's, including one recently. Tornados, thank God, have never taken any of our friends or loved ones so far. So our home, lacking stairs, is at least about 15 times safer than my parents' multi-story home with their basement, in terms of our combined "tornado/stair-fall risk." That's probably typical, figuring a little less than two flights of stairs on average for those of you "lucky" enough to have a multi story house.

Then I thought about this interesting little video I saw last night:


https://www.facebook.com/ezraklein/videos/vb.232843448409/10154000566913410/?type=2&theater

Videos like this certainly do not convince me that the government should stop allowing people to build multi-story houses, nor require everybody to take out their stairs and install elevators. But which of you can fault me -- or anyone -- for choosing to live in a house without stairs?

Happy as I am tonight that my parents' home has a basement in case of a tornado warning, I also am happy that the local housing code where mom and dad live requires firm banisters.
 
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skidmark

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I'm still trying to wrap my head round the fact that the guy lives not on but apparently in a floating ice cube.

Turns out no twisters in our little berg

stay safe.
 

The Donkey

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Your risk calculus is faulty.

That's one in 1700 actual falls versus one in 60,000 mere passive exposures to a tornado.

:uhoh:

Looking at multiple sources, my original internet finds (or at least my understanding of them) seemed to vastly overstate the risks, but the relative risks appear about right.

From the National Safety Council, based on 2000 data. (No particular reason to think these have changed much):

LIFETIME risk of death from falling down stairs: 1 in 2739.

LIFETIME risk of death from cataclysmic storm: 1 in 73,062

http://danger.mongabay.com/injury_death.htm

You can read the statistics there about firearms deaths yourself.

The article below says that the risk of dying in a tornado is 1 in 60,000, but it does not specify annual versus lifetime:

http://www.asktheodds.com/death/tornado-odds/

That article also says (perhaps ironically) that the risk of dying in a bathtub fall is about 1 in 11,000. So if I retreat to the bathtub in a tornado warning, I had better do that carefully too.
 

skidmark

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:lol:

Well, its complicated.

I can only imagine what you would say if I told you that I really live in a "field."

It would pretty much depend on whether it was a hard science, a soft science, one of the humanities, or some social pap.

stay safe.
 

The Donkey

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It would pretty much depend on whether it was a hard science, a soft science, one of the humanities, or some social pap.

stay safe.

Springfield map is social pap.

Here is the relevant hard science presented as social pap:

http://www.cracked.com/article_18849_6-statistically-full-s2321t-dangers-media-loves-to-hype_p2.html

As far as soft sciences and humanities are concerned, nobody will take me up on my metaphor.

How can I get to the soft sciences if nobody puts me in my place about stairs and banisters?
 

nonameisgood

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Big D
So you're saying that, eventually, 5000 of those alive today will die in a tornado? That seems unlikely since only about 80 people die each year from tornados But with a US life expectancy of 78 it's numerically close, if not really accurate. So it's more accurate to say that there is a 1 in 60,000 risk of an individual dying as the result of a tornado, sometime during an 83 year life time.


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Citizen

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Fairfax Co., VA
So you're saying that, eventually, 5000 of those alive today will die in a tornado? That seems unlikely since only about 80 people die each year from tornados But with a US life expectancy of 78 it's numerically close, if not really accurate. So it's more accurate to say that there is a 1 in 60,000 risk of an individual dying as the result of a tornado, sometime during an 83 year life time.


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This sounds a bit like the gun-grabber hype that you have 23 (made up figure) times greater chance of dying from a gunshot if there is a gun in your home.

Phhht.

Angering your spouse while there is a gun in the house, or unsafe gun handling has nothing to do with it. Simply the mere presence of a defensive arm means you're "x" times more likely to get shot.

Ahhhhahhahahahahahahah!!!
 

OC for ME

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White Oak Plantation
So you're saying that, eventually, 5000 of those alive today will die in a tornado? That seems unlikely since only about 80 people die each year from tornados But with a US life expectancy of 78 it's numerically close, if not really accurate. So it's more accurate to say that there is a 1 in 60,000 risk of an individual dying as the result of a tornado, sometime during an 83 year life time.

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http://www.dartmouth.edu/~ears5/handouts/Prob_dying6_25_99.html

...unless you live in a mobile home park...
 

hafnhaf

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Apr 12, 2013
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Williamsburg, VA
its not the trailer park per se. its just the fact that when you line up all those trailers you get a massive co-location/phased-array effect from all those tornado magnets they install in the trailers. just kinda sucks those tornadoes right in there...
 

nonameisgood

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Whoever wrote that needs an edumacation. That says that roughly 5000 people die in tornadoes in the US in any one year. The figure is closer to 80. (1 in 3,750,000)

If all 80 deaths are in Oklahoma (they aren't) then the rate/risk would be 1 in 48000.

While not accurate for an individual, it is true for the population. 2.6 million people died in the US in 2013, out of 300-odd million people, or 1 in 115.


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The Donkey

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its not the trailer park per se. its just the fact that when you line up all those trailers you get a massive co-location/phased-array effect from all those tornado magnets they install in the trailers. just kinda sucks those tornadoes right in there...

An excellent point.

If I lived in a trailer home, or anyplace else with a phased-array tornado magnet I might very well be missing that basement notwithstanding those stairs.

Which brings me back to firearms:

The short video Ezra Klein recommended in the link I provided above with all the statistics is also in the link below. It is at the beginning of a Vox article with some additional short interesting videos throughout. The material is presented in an explicit anti-gun fashion. Much "pap" perhaps masquerading as soft science: http://www.vox.com/2015/10/3/9444417/gun-violence-united-states-america

While I disagree with the conclusions, and find many of the "facts" to be presented in misleading fashion, some of the statistics as well as the statistical and other analysis seems facially plausible.

As a pro-gun liberal I do not find it necessary to bash my head against the wall anytime the lefty media comes at me with an argument about guns that I disagree with.

I do not trust the government to recognize that we may someday be as vulnerable as if we were in trailers on the Oklahoma plains where irrespective of the magnets, those tornadoes might indeed be aiming towards us, even if they are not out to get us.

Recognizing that such things are possible, I also recognize that they are not probable and that such thoughts put me in the minority of my fellow countrymen.

Even if you disagree, I recommend watching anyway, unless you are really concerned about your head exploding: As Michael Corleone might advise, if nothing else it pays to understand how they are going to come at you.
 
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The Donkey

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National Safety Council: http://www.nsc.org/learn/safety-knowledge/Pages/injury-facts-chart.aspx

Not agreeing or disagreeing with the Dartmouth handout, nor the NSC findings, which have the smell of the United Nations about them.

Numbers are what you make them up to be..."statistics are more pliable" I believe the adageis.

Of course statistics can be misleading and are oft used to mislead. And these days, people -- especially politicians -- are inclined to just make up figures so that they sound more plausible. Nobody has yet lost an election because of a "pants on fire."

But that adageis can be applied to all statistics one disagrees with: if someone poses statistics that conflict with your world view, it is a license to stick your fingers in your ears and yell "la la la." Smoke like a chimney, drive like a maniac, don't spare the salt on those Mickey-Dees fries, and pass me another beer to wash down another Oxycontin. "Its called freedom, man, and I have a right to my opinion."

It is more meaningful, I would suggest, to really engage.
 
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DWCook

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Sep 28, 2010
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Lenexa, Kansas
Here in Kansas we're used to Tornado's and as the season is coming up! I have a couple mutual people who just built a new house out in Tonganoxie, Kansas. One opted out getting a basement installed so he could save money and move into his house sooner. I would call that an stupid decision, but hey it's not my house or situation to throw my opinion in. Sadly whenever I see on the news a Tornado that remotely near by, half my brain tells me to grab my phone/camera and go record it haha!
 

solus

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Aug 22, 2013
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here nc
Here in Kansas we're used to Tornado's and as the season is coming up! I have a couple mutual people who just built a new house out in Tonganoxie, Kansas. One opted out getting a basement installed so he could save money and move into his house sooner. I would call that an stupid decision, but hey it's not my house or situation to throw my opinion in. Sadly whenever I see on the news a Tornado that remotely near by, half my brain tells me to grab my phone/camera and go record it haha!

might have put in a bunker ~big pit w/semi trailer placed in it and covered w/dirt...like the olden days of root cellars...

ipse
 

The Donkey

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Sep 21, 2006
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Northern Virginia
Donkey - FYI your original link is not going to a video about tornados at this time. It is something about comparing U.S. mass shootings to other countries.
I tried to pull up other videos by this guy but didn't see anything weather related.

Metaphor. Meta-phore. Perhaps OCDO should put up a special "alert" button for those.
 
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