Characteristics of the Hănești tornado

Abstract

The study of tornadoes on the territory of Romania is recent. That is why we turned to American geographical literature, utilizing the Enhanced Fujita (EF) scale which represents the intensity of tornadoes in the United States of America (2007) as well as Canada (2013) based on the damage they cause (damage indicators, or DI). Each damage indicator is correlated with a particular estimated wind speed, depending on their degree of damage (DoD), and lastly the tornado is associated with the maximum intensity of all indicators. Six damage indicators have been analysed. In the case of the last two (27 and 28) it can be clearly seen that wind had reached speeds of 128 - 134 mph, equivalent to 206 - 215 km/h. This means that the tornado that occurred in Hănești was an EF2, being in the interval of 178 - 217 km/h (111 - 135 mph).