Tornado History Project and Tornado Map - Feedback?

[jlietz]

Hi,

I've been a member here for a few years now, asking a lot of video related questions (and answering a few...), but I have a non-video related topic this time. I have started the Tornado History Project (http://www.tornadohistoryproject.com) to make United States tornado history easily accessible to anyone. I have imported raw tornado data from the National Weather Service and created a user searchable database that ouputs the data in human readable (and sorted) form. I have also integrated the data with a Google Maps application so that each tornado is individually mapped (and if available, its path is mapped). Additionally, by clicking the "Tornado Map" link, multiple tornadoes (and their paths) can be mapped at once. I hope to get user submitted photos, videos, and/or newspaper clippings of as many tornadoes as possible.

What do you guys and gals think? Any suggestions? I'm not 100% done with all pages, but the "marquee" stuff is done, like the searchable database and the map.

Thanks all.

Josh

[lordsmurf]

I'd love to look at something like that once it's done!

Go one further....

Get people to submit personal stories of their tornado eperiences, maybe start up a "tornado support" forum for victims and people that are trying to overcome such tragedies. Get yrouself tornadohelp.com, hmm?

You could make an awesome site, which would (I bet) easily generate advertising from various products and organizations (meaning it pays for itself).

I don't know of anything else that eixsts out there.

[jlietz]

I'd love to look at something like that once it's done!

I should clarify that everything except the "Tornado Statistics" page and "User photo, video, and/or news Submission" page is done...The mapping and database portion is up and ready to view.

Go one further....
Get people to submit personal stories of their tornado eperiences...

I actually thought about that...There could be a link to "survivor" stories or "eyewitness" stories just like the links to the photos, etc... Since you have also thought of it, maybe its a sign that its something I should do...

[lordsmurf]

I've lived in tornado alley all my life, and I'm not aware of any indy site with the topics you mentioned or the ones I mentioned. I'd do it myself (it's a really good idea!), but I have other things on my website-making list.

[JimmyJoeBob]

This is really good. I live in a Tornado prone state like LS and others (all states can be a target). Smurf is on target about the advertising to generate revenue. Go for it! By the way I looked up the Tornado that hit Dallas County in 1957 when I was 11, remember it well.
Great Job!!

[lordsmurf]

This one was very close to me at the time:
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/papers/overpass/slide18.html

I remember the entire sky was basically pitch black, power had been knocked out, and the winds outside were basically what I could call "the sounds of hell coming my way". We huddled in a closet and hoped for the best.

[BJ_M]

great idea

[jlietz]

Thanks for the positive comments! I hope that others find the site useful (or, at the very least, fun...), but I have a feeling I'll be battling the "PageRank" problem for awhile. If any site owners viewing this topic are willing to link to the Torndao History Project from their own site it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Edit: Just saw the sticky about member websites. Submitting my request now....

[jlietz]

Hey, just wanted to let anyone who is interested know that I have released a major update to my tornado site. The most prominent new feature is the ability for users to leave comments/personal stories about any tornado. Hope you enjoy!

[AlecWest]

I was curious about something. I was checking out maps/comments on Kansas tornadoes and, in index 1898/1899, saw this map:



Is this indicative of a Google glitch ... or representative of a tornado that disappears, only to reappear a few miles to the East? I suspect it might be a Google glitch since tornadoes don't generally do this SPECIFICALLY on a state line.

[jlietz]

Is this indicative of a Google glitch ... or representative of a tornado that disappears, only to reappear a few miles to the East?

Nice catch! But its neither...This is an error in the National Weather Service records. If you look at the touchdown and liftoff coordinates for this tornado (to see the search for tornado 1899 go here), they don't seem to match:



Specifically, the liftoff coordinate of the 1st state segment (Oklahoma) and the touchdown coordinate of the 2nd state segment (Kansas) differ by .10 in longitude. You would expect them to match perfectly, as it is just the shared coordinate at which the tornado crossed the state line. However, I took a 2nd look at the raw data from the NWS and can confirm that the error exists there. I may go ahead and change it.

Interestingly, I have noticed a few other errors in the official records. I emailed someone at the National Weather Service with a list of suspected errors and a fairly detailed account of why I believed them to be errors, but to be honest, the person I contacted didn't seem all that motivated to do anything about it. He said the raw public data (the data I used) is pulled from a master NWS database and that he couldn't change the public data file unless the master database had been changed. I inquired as to who else I should contact, but he never got back to me (its been over 2 months...) I should probably give it another try...

Also, don't be shy about posting a comment or two at the website...Pointing out suspected errors is certainly welcome.