[John H K]

Do a web search for "Jarrell" "Texas" and "Tornado" that one is the gold standard for F5s if you want to see some pics.

People don't really have a concept of F5 damage. It doesn't mean destroyed houses, it means a PERFECTLY clean foundation with no debris from the house within half a mile. And pavement ripped up.

[Husker24]

Bingo! Jarrel Texas, that was the one I was talking about where sidewalks were blown away and there was no debris left.......unimaginable!

[razorback-bert]

pictures

http://www.k5kj.net/jarrell.htm

I have been a football field away from one touching down in a cotton field and have lost roofs and fences to others.

[maranatha]

My son drove through Jarrell going from our house in Midland TX to Huntsville TX. He was a hour or so ahead of that storm. We had just moved a few months before from a town right next to Jarrell.

An F-5 hit Lubbock TX about 15 years ago. We lived in Littlefield about 35 miles west of Lubbock (not at the time of the F-5 though) and we never actually had one hit Littlefield, but there were constant threats and violent thunderstorms, hail blowing out car windows and such. It was horrible just always being under tornado watches and hunkering down and waiting. The sounds of those storms were terrifying. Hate it.

[VOA]

People don't really have a concept of F5 damage. It doesn't mean destroyed houses,
it means a PERFECTLY clean foundation with no debris from the house within half a mile.

You are right...it is the "force of nature".
I stopped by Midwest City after the last "Big One" and saw a couple bared foundation...
not quite Jerrell though.

I stumbled across a great reference book on tornados and high wind events
in the library at Oklahoma State University maybe 10 years ago.
I can't remember the title, but the book scared the ---- out of me. Reading about
huge fuel tanks taking flight, chimneys being lifted clean with parts of the attached
roof (acting as an airfoil)...and stories of flattened part of forests from
just straight line winds that the Weather Services of yesteryear couldn't visualize...
SCARY!

Now, at even the warning of just winds in excess of 40 mph...I take cover.
I don't like the idea of being impaled by a fence post launched by an unexpected
gust or tornadic wind.