[300magnum]

It is the first F-5 since the weather service revised its scale this year, in an effort to more comprehensively gauge tornadoes’ damage potential, with less emphasis on wind speed.

I guess since they are now lowering the bar, we are going to now have a lot more F5 tornados. And the Dims can blame it on global warming and/or Bush.

[L98Fiero]

Bank on it.

[Psycho_Bunny]

The new scale actually does make sense; the author is mischaracterizing what it actually measures: not so much wind speed as power.....although it's still based on estimations of wind speed.

Fast wind doesn't necessarily equate overall power.  A tight, 1/8th of a mile-wide tornado with wind speeds of 280 MPH will not do the damage of a 3/4 of a mile-wide at 230 MPH but under the old system the smaller tornado would have been labeled as "more powerful".

Even the "F" in the F-scale, Fujita, knew his classification was flawed and at the time he developed the system, he knew that professional estimations of wind speed, based on power, were somewhat hit-or-miss.

Think of it like this:  would you rather get t-boned in an intersection by a Cooper Mini going 90 MPH, or an 18-wheeler doing 75?