Originally Posted by
andyhaus1057
I need to tell a few sentences about the Cyclone of 1896, include the number of people who died, where it struck, and also if the cyclone struck today as it did in 1896, what would be the consequences?
Here is what I have. Can you please help me edit it so that it meets the requirements?
[What's your title going to be? I'm presuming that you're going to need to have one.]
[Also, are you gong to cite your sources?]
The tornado first hit the ground along a ridge in the southwest portion of the city, near the St. Louis State Hospital ("City Hospital"). It next went along Jefferson avenue, through Lafayette Park to Seventh and Rutger streets. Then it moved on toward Soulard and the levee before crossing the river on toward East St. Louis in Illinois.
In its wake, the storm left at least 138 dead in St. Louis, another 118 in East St. Louis. Approximately 85 persons were missing in St. Louis and over one hundred more missing on the east-side. Many of those listed as missing were certainly killed and their bodies either carried away by the wind or by the river, with little hope that the bodies would ever be recovered. Over a thousand residents were physically injured.
[I would move this and the next paragraph to the beginning.] The "Cyclone of 1896" has been described as the single most deadly event that hit the St. Louis area in recorded history. In little over fifteen minutes the storm fully completed its course of death and destruction. 315 bodies found. Over 8,800 buildings were destroyed or damaged. Homes, churches, trees, fences and park facilities were uprooted or destroyed. Elsewhere in the city, Eads Bridge lost 300 feet of its eastern approach, the City Hospital was badly damaged, gas lines cut, electric service knocked out, trees uprooted, power plants ruined, street cars overturned, steamboats along the levee sunk.
It was even reported that railroad cars were blown from their tracks over on the East side. The sounds of roofs crashing to the ground was described as an "explosion of a hundred cannons". Property carried away by the tornado have been found as far away as Vandalia, Illinois. An estimated cost of over 10 million dollars.
The first significant tornado of the day formed near Bellflower, Missouri and killed a woman. Three students died and sixteen were injured when the Dye School in Audrain County, Missouri was hit at around 6:15 P.M. The same tornado killed one student and injured 19 others at the Bean Creek school a few minutes later. At 6:30, two super cells thunderstorms produced two tornadoes. One decimated farms in New Minden, Hoyleton, Richview, and Irvington, Illinois. Twenty-seven more people died in the other Illinois tornadoes as a result of this outbreak.
The tornado spawned from the other super cell became the third deadliest and the most costly tornado in the history of the United States. It touched down in St. Louis, Missouri, then one of the largest and most influential cities in the country. 137 people died as the tornado traversed the core of the city leaving a mile wide (1.6 km) continuous swath of destroyed homes, schools, saloons, factories, mills, churches, parks, and railroad yards. More people probably died on boats on the Mississippi River as the bodies may have gone downriver.
When the tornado crossed the river and hit East Saint Louis, Illinois, it was smaller but more intense. An additional 118 people were killed. The confirmed death toll is 255, with some estimates above 400. More than 1,000 were injured. The tornado was later rated F4 on the Fujita scale. Adjusted for wealth and inflation (1997 USDA?), it is the costliest tornado in U.S. history at an estimated $2.9 billion. Enough damage was done to the city that there was some question that St. Louis might not be able to host the 1896 Republican National Convention in June.
It is somewhat rare for the core of a large city to be hit directly by a tornado (due to their relatively small area and the relative lack of large cities in the highest tornado threat region)--especially a large, intense tornado--yet several other tornadoes have tracked through the City of St. Louis and several of these tornadoes were also very deadly and destructive. Among these events are: 1871 (9 killed), 1890 (4 killed), 1904 (3 killed, 100 injured), 1927 (79 killed, 550 injured, 2nd costliest in US history), and 1959 (21 killed, 345 injured). This makes St. Louis the worst tornado afflicted urban area in the U.S. Additionally, the Greater St. Louis area is the scene of even more historically destructive and deadly tornadoes.
