We got to Havana, Cuba, Sunday morning after a red eye
flight. We settled into our apartment, went out for some dinner, and got back
to the apartment. After we got back it started to rain. Then
after an hour the power went out and it started to get very windy. The windows
and shutters wouldn’t stay shut and were swinging around and water was pouring
through the windows, even the ones that were closes. There were big puddles in the living room and bedrooms. It
wasn’t until the next day we realized it was a tornado that hit Havana because we
got texts from friends and family asking if we were okay.
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| After the storm it was a sunny view. During the storm these were the shutters that were flapping around and we couldn't get the window shut. We couldn't see the tall buildings in the background because of the rain. |
The tornado hit south of where we are staying but we still got
high winds and lots of rain in a very short time. It killed 3 people and over 170
were injured. Buildings collapsed and cars were flipped. Tornadoes are very
rare in Cuba, this was the strongest one since 1940. The wind speed got up to
about 320km/h. Tornadoes are classified into 5 different categories, F-0
through F-5. F-0 are the mildest and F-5 are the most dangerous. The tornado
that hit Havana was a F-3. It was a very exciting welcome to Cuba.
Sources and storm photos:
Sources and storm photos:
What a crazy welcome to Cuba! When we read about the tornado hitting Havana, we were a bit frantic because of the lack of communications. Thankfully all is well and you have an incredible weather experience to talk about.
ReplyDeleteThat's wild! I'm glad it didn't strike where you were staying. Great description of the storm and thanks for the info about how tornadoes are classified. I've never lived somewhere where tornadoes are common, so they seem very crazy to me!
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